Why reading books helps train your brain

The reading from books counts as exercise for brain and it even improves emotional intelligence, according to several studies. Since by the pandemic from COVID-19 Much of the world’s population spends a lot of time indoors, which could serve as an opportunity to have a practice that has diminished in recent years due to various cultural and technological changes. The exercise that counts is attention to reading, so the differences between reading on paper, on an electronic device or listening to audiobooks is of secondary importance.

Among the numerous questions about the benefits of reading in childhood, it has been proven to be beneficial for children’s brain development: “A twin study published by the Society for Child Development Research found that children who started reading at a younger age performed better on certain intelligence tests, as well as the size of his vocabulary, ”I quote Popular science the job.

But also if the intellectual exercise of reading has advantages: a study from the University of Stanford showed that adult brain development continues. Measured by magnetic resonance how reading exercises affect different parts of the organ. Volunteers came in resonator with a book by Jane Austen and read in real time during the test.

The neurobiologists found that when they focused on the plot of the story, ‘a dramatic and unexpected increases in blood flow to areas of the brain beyond those in charge of executive functions, the areas normally associated with attention to a task, ”said Natalie Phillips, the literature specialist who participated in the multidisciplinary team. Phillips added that this general increase in blood flow while reading “suggests that Paying attention to literary texts requires the coordination of several complex cognitive functions”.

The MRIs tracked blood flow in several cases: while the participants they looked over a text, like they would browse a bookstore, and while they read carefullylike when they are studying for an exam. Also in a lecture concentrated but pleasant. The different reading styles created different and complex activity patterns.

The attention experiment focused on the cognitive dynamics of the different types of concentration possible in reading, including floating attention. In all cases, a noticeable brain training, which can help reduce or limit cognitive decline.

That analyzed another study from the National Institutes of Health Research Zhunan, Taiwan. Almost made 2000 people over 64 years old and with updates after six, ten and fourteen years, he analyzed the value of stimulating reading as an intellectual activity. It is known that inside lifestyle factors that help keep your mind active as people get older, there are games, puzzles, attention to radio and television, as well as reading.

The age group choice of the respondents was due to the fact that the The prevalence of cognitive deficits from the age of 60 varies between 6.7% and 25.2%, and worsens with age. This was estimated in 2015 the total number of people with dementia worldwide was 46.8 million, which corresponds to a social cost of 818,000 million.

“Reading is one thing typical intellectual activity. Compared to other leisure activities, such as physical or social, it is more sedentary and isolated. Reading for pleasure has been shown to have health benefits for older people by prolonging life and cognitive skills could be the mediator, ”the authors wrote. “A higher reading frequency, for example two or more times per week, was associated with a lower risk of long-term decline in cognitive functioningThey emphasized.

And while the people who generally read the most are people who are better educated in childhood and youth“The study also showed that many reading activities are also anticipated better cognitive outcomes at all levelsare educational, and that people with less formal education can benefit the most in the long run ”from this exercise.

The Taiwanese researchers cited other articles to which theirs were added, including one on “the effect of learning therapy, one training program consisting of reading and calculating, which activates the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, ”which showed improvements in the cognitive performance of patients with dementia. Another one performed among 801 religious, in the United States, who were followed every seven years effects of increasing basic cognitive activity: appears to reduce the risk of developing Alzheimer’s and generally of cognitive decline in old age.

While it is true that “reading frequency could be related to early education,” the researchers acknowledged long-term effect that learning can have on a person’s life, when comparing participants in their studies with little education with others with higher education, they found that the introduction of reading stimulus works evenly.

“It is possible that less educated people do not have the intellectual reading skills of more educated people, and their previous cognitive abilities before cognitive decline were lower,” the authors noted. Nevertheless, “their ability to benefit from reading activity was the same over the long run, and even higher, to that of people with a higher education level ”.

A third study, from The New School, in New York City, found that lecture fiction Especially literary is good for emotional intelligence of individuals: how the story focuses deep portraits of the characters’ feelings and ideas, functions as an exercise for the human ability to understand the perspectives of other people. Something similar concluded a study by the University of Toronto: the “improvement in empathy,” as the text defined, “is derived from practice processes such as inference and projection that happen during literary reading, and the content of fiction, which is usually about human characters and their interactions in the social world”.

When reading fiction, the brain works in exactly the same way as when processing information about other people: understanding stories activates the same areas of the brain as the process of understanding othersWrote the Canadian researchers. Both fiction and the daily exercise of consciousness are based on for the human mind simulations of the social world: mental models.

“Fiction simulates the self in interaction,” they compared. “People who read it improve their understanding of others. This effect is especially noticeable in the case of literary fiction, allowing people to adapt themselves too. These effects are partly due to the personal bonding in stories, through inference and emotional participation, and partly on the content of fiction, including complex characters and circumstances that do not occur in everyday lifeThey concluded.

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