Will Walking Make You Smart?

Diane Keaton's Personal Library

Feature Entry: Will Walking Make You Smart?

It is probably true that bloggers enjoy reading the blogs of others. One of my favorites is Psyblog.com.uk. Their recent entry was “7 Simple Ways to Improve Your Memory Without Any Training” The key word is simple because most memory enhancers required quite amount of mental energy. We will not bore by describing the seven ways but a few of their labels include:

Write about your problems
Look at a natural scene
Say words aloud
Meditate
Predict that you will remember
Use your hands or other gestures while trying to remember something
Move your body up when recalling a positive thought and down for a negative

Now here is a clincher for improving your memory. According to Psyblog,”Probably the best way of improving your overall cognitive health is exercise. Studies regularly find that increasing aerobic fitness is particularly good for executive function and working memory.

Randomized controlled trials in Neuromolecular Medicine have shown that exercise improves cognitive function across the board and is superior to computer programs designed for brain training, drugs, nutritional supplements and meditation. Walking and other aerobic forms of exercise have been found to be particularly good at enhancing executive control processes including planning, recall, and working memory.

Psyblog also said that “Exercise is also thought to encourage the growth of new brain cells. In the past scientists always thought that neurogenesis - growing new brain cells - was impossible in humans. New studies, though, have shown that we can grow new brain cells.”

How about just resting on the couch—not good. Sedentary living leads to cognitive deterioration. So, want to live longer with a higher quality of life, start a walking program.

Now what was I saying?

Moneywalker