Leisure for the Body. Labor for the Brain.

What do you do when you take a break from work?  In your leisure time, what is something that you routinely find yourself doing?  What is your default solution to the eternal problem of boredom?

What if I told you that your choice of leisure time activity is linked to how you may handle memory loss when you get older?

In the last post, Ryan discussed structural changes in the brains of mice that were housed in an enriched environment (i.e. where they could interact with other mice and had several novel objects to play with).  As humans, our life choices, activities, and experiences form an integral part of our enriched environment and affect our brain’s structure and function.  Our leisurely engagements – reading books, hiking, painting, or online social networking – activate different parts of our brain.  Upon repeated indulgence in our favorite activity, these neuronal networks become stronger and over time, they are robust enough to influence the brain’s function.

Let’s explore the different ways in which our leisure activities may influence our brain’s functionality as we age:

1. Passive effect:  Intellectually and socially engaging activities increase the number of synapses (sites of neuronal communication).  As we age, ‘stronger’ neurons compensate for ‘weaker’ neurons that may bear the brunt of aging-related stress.  In other words, strong neurons show more efficient cognitive functions, counterbalancing the loss of function in affected brain areas.  Example: An elderly individual may forget his home address, but remembers the directions to his house, thus compensating for his memory loss.
2. Active effect I:  Even though the number of synapses remains the same, it is possible that the activities we choose could strengthen the synaptic connections we already have.  In other words, people who do certain leisure activities may have more efficient circuits of neuronal connectivity for that activity.  Example: Skills like playing the piano are retained even when old.
3. Active effect II:  The ease with which our brain can use alternative brain networks improves and makes us better at perceiving an idea in a multi-dimensional way.  Example: Using several different theories to solve a challenging math problem.

The more time we spend in an enriched environment that enhances our physical activity, learning, and social skills, the more we train our brain to become resilient to age-related deterioration.  The activities we tend to do during our free time makes an important contribution towards our brain’s agility in recruiting several networks.  This resourceful functioning of our brain, in turn, makes us more accomplished at carrying out an assigned task.

So, the next time you’re contemplating how best to ‘kill’ time on a lazy Saturday afternoon, remember how your choice might influence your future aging brain!