It turns out that playing a specific brain training video game could slash your risk of developing dementia by a quarter over two decades.
A major study published Monday in the journal Alzheimer's & Dementia: Translational Research & Clinical Interventions has delivered what experts are calling the most compelling evidence yet that cognitive exercises can genuinely protect the brain long-term.
"It's very surprising," said Marilyn Albert, director of the Johns Hopkins Alzheimer's Disease Research Center. "It's not at all what I would have expected."
Dr Thomas Wisniewski, who leads cognitive neurology at NYU Langone Health, called the findings "astonishing."
Nearly 3,000 people aged 65 and over took part in the study (stock image)
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"It's really the first clear documentation in a randomised controlled trial that at least some form of cognitive training can lower the risk of dementia," he said.
The research comes from the Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly trial, better known as ACTIVE, which was funded by the National Institutes of Health.
Nearly 3,000 people aged 65 and over took part, none of whom had significant cognitive problems when they signed up.
About a quarter were from minority backgrounds, and most were women – a particularly relevant detail given that women develop dementia at almost double the rate of men.
Participants initially completed up to 10 training sessions, each lasting between 60 and 75 minutes, twice weekly over five weeks.
Roughly half then received additional booster sessions totalling up to 23 hours spread across three years.
Researchers tracked their health through Medicare records for 20 years to see who developed dementia.
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Those who completed the speed training with booster sessions saw a dramatic 25 per cent reduction in dementia risk compared to the control group. Crucially, participants who skipped the boosters didn't see any benefit at all.
The exercises focused on processing visual information quickly and accurately – spotting objects on screen and making rapid decisions about them.
"If we're driving in a car and we have all these things going on in the periphery that we're paying attention to, we have to decide what's important and what's not," Albert explained.
Meanwhile, memory training taught word recall strategies, and reasoning training worked on pattern recognition. Neither showed any protective effect against dementia.
Experts believe the difference lies in implicit versus explicit learning – speed training builds unconscious skills rather than conscious fact retention.
Harvard Medical School neurologist, Dr Sanjula Singh, compared it to learning to ride a bicycle.
'The change is durable even without continued practice'
|BRAIN HQ
"Once the brain rewires for these skills, the change is durable even without continued practice," she said. "A child can learn how to ride a bike in about 10 hours, and afterwards that learning lasts a lifetime."
This is neuroplasticity in action; the brain's brilliant ability to adapt and reshape itself throughout our lives.
Dr Kellyann Niotis from Weill Cornell Medicine suggested speed training may also boost something called cognitive reserve, which helps healthy brains resist dementia's effects.
"It builds on the concept that relatively small amounts of effort can really pay dividends for decades to come," said Dr Richard Isaacson, a preventive neurologist in Florida.
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