Memory Training Shown to Turn Up Brainpower

A new study has found that it may be possible to train people to be more intelligent, increasing the brainpower they had at birth.

Until now, it had been widely assumed that the kind of mental ability that allows us to solve new problems without having any relevant previous experience — what psychologists call fluid intelligence — is innate and cannot be taught (though people can raise their grades on tests of it by practicing).

But in the new study, researchers describe a method for improving this skill, along with experiments to prove it works.

The key, researchers found, was carefully structured training in working memory — the kind that allows memorization of a telephone number just long enough to dial it. This type of memory is closely related to fluid intelligence, according to background information in the article, and appears to rely on the same brain circuitry. So the researchers reasoned that improving it might lead to improvements in fluid intelligence.

First they measured the fluid intelligence of four groups of volunteers using standard tests. Then they trained each in a complicated memory task, an elaborate variation on Concentration, the child’s card game, in which they memorized simultaneously presented auditory and visual stimuli that they had to recall later.

The game was set up so that as the participants succeeded, the tasks became harder, and as they failed, the tasks became easier. This assured a high level of difficulty, adjusted individually for each participant, but not so high as to destroy motivation to keep working. The four groups underwent a half-hour of training daily for 8, 12, 17 and 19 days, respectively. At the end of each training, researchers tested the participants’ fluid intelligence again. To make sure they were not just improving their test-taking skills, the researchers compared...

Intelligence is a very tricky concept.

To start with, it seems to be the “flip side” to creativity.

That is, people who can maintain a focused attention are able to grasp far more complex problems and solve them.

However, to have creative leaps, maintaining an unfocused state of mind for a length of time permits the imagination free reign.

But people have learned a trick that makes them vacillate back and forth between mental focus and unfocused, most likely because it increases survivability in high risk situations.

It is our talking to ourselves, our internal dialogue. It is taught to us from infancy, and we still practice it though are lives are far safer today. Unfortunately, it also interferes with both our intelligence and creativity.

Many different intellectual skills, such as meditation, must begin with task of “shutting off the noise” in the head, and with practice, a degree of control over internal dialogue allows for longer periods of both a focused and an unfocused state of mind.

In raw intelligence, you would seem to gain 10 or 20 IQ points, just by being able to concentrate on what you are doing.

This is why individuals with Asperger’s disorder seem to be very intelligent. They are incapable of maintaining an internal dialogue, so their focus on a problem may run to hours or even days without distraction.

And this is just one of the problems in intelligence.

Another is confusing intelligence with memorization, a frequent error. Techniques to improve memory are well known, yet few people practice them on a regular basis, finding little need for them. And they are usually correct.

Other abilities that are often confused with intelligence are spatial visualization, or being able to imagine abstract problems in your head; finely tuned senses; physical dexterity; empathy; verbosity and vocabulary; even appearance can be confused with intelligence.

Education and test taking ability are confused as well. Many highly educated people are not particularly bright, which is self evident.

“That is, people who can maintain a focused attention are able to grasp far more complex problems and solve them.

However, to have creative leaps, maintaining an unfocused state of mind for a length of time permits the imagination free reign.”

Thanks for the insight and reminder. I was just trying to get my daughter to focus on her long division and her mind got side tracked following some numbers off to who knows where. I started to get a bit frustrated and she said “Dad - you know I always have to be thinking of SOMETHING!” So I calmed down, had her stop, think of being up camping and fishing to clear her head (and mine!) and she was able to get back on task.

She does come up with the best stories though - and made-up games!

One of the better exercises I’ve heard of to increase control over the internal dialogue is based on an interesting theory.

It is that the part of the brain in charge of talking to ourselves is the same part that involves attention. It has finite resources, so if you can fully use them on attention instead of talking, with practice it gives you more and more control over that part of your mind. Sometimes described as like having a “talk to yourself on/off switch”.

By not talking to yourself, you learn how not to talk to yourself.

Thus the exercise is to do several physically undemanding things at the same time, that use a lot of attention.

Ordinary walking uses a great deal of attention, directed to the legs to keep navigating, avoiding obstacles, etc. So it is a great starting point. Added to that, as you walk, holding your hands in some unusual manner, like with two of the fingers crossed. It doesn’t matter what, just as long as your attention is directed to your arms and hands as well as your legs and feet. If you lose attention on your hands, you just change how you are holding them.

The real trick is to unfocus your eyes. And this uses some interesting psychology. Normally, when you look at things, your attention and focus is “point to point”. You look from tiny spot to tiny spot, which uses just minimal attention, seeing most things peripherally. But when you unfocus your eyes, the whole 180 degree tableau in front of you is equal, as far as your attention is concerned.

And this uses a whopping great amount of attention.

Combining all three things: walking, holding your hands funny, and unfocusing your eyes, overwhelms that small part of your brain by taking so much attention, that it just doesn’t have the ability to keep up the internal dialogue.

And you stop talking to yourself, for longer and longer times.

Walking around this way is easy to learn, and with just a mile or two, every day or two, you start to notice increased concentration in about two weeks. And the effects tend to be cumulative, so the more you do it, the better you get.

Imagine being able to sit down and do an entire SAT test without distraction.

I knew one young man who did this exercise, almost because he had to. His internal dialogue was so intense that he continually vacillated back and forth between focused and unfocused. The end result was that he sounded like a California surf bum. He could barely speak a sentence without being distracted. It was both exhaustive and very frustrating for him.

In about a month, I saw him again, and he looked revitalized. He was almost a different person, could speak in whole paragraphs, and loved the ability to actually finish things he had started. I also noted that he was bursting with energy, no longer having to commit so much brain power to internal dialogue and bouncing back and forth.

There are all sorts of ways of accomplishing much the same thing, but he is the reason I remember this exercise so well.

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