Monday, September 07, 2009

I'm not wasting my time - I'm boosting my brainpower

Many an office worker has frittered away the odd ten minutes playing the computer game Tetris, fitting different shaped blocks into a virtual box as they fall from the top of the screen. Scientists from the Mind Research Network in Albuquerque used MRI scans to assess the effects of Tetris on brainpower in 26 adolescent girls who played the game for 30 minutes a day, over a three-month period. They used MRI scans to measure the thickness of the girls' grey matter and the efficiency of their brain activity. Compared to a control group who did not play the game the girls who played Tetris showed increased grey-matter thickness in part of the left frontal lobe and left temporal lobe and greater efficiency in the right frontal and parietal lobes.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090901082851.htm

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