Hey everyone, this is my first post here so I thought I'd introduce myself with what I hope is something useful.
Late 2017 I was looking for ways to get an edge before I started pre-med. My search led me to a lot of meta-analyses that add up to over a hundred studies in favor of the idea that IQ is actually trainable. I’ve come to believe training like this far exceeds the benefits of nootropics, even before considering the risk to reward ratio of experimenting with your brain chemistry.
I was interested to see that the studies measured real world performance benefits to unrelated tasks outside of training. But the push that got me to commit to the training myself was the neuro-imaging studies that measured increased functional connectivity of the fronto-paretial network (see my link about FPN and IQ)
This page gives more context to the research I’ve linked and talks about software that incorporates the training methods with the most evidence behind them. Here’s the meta-analyses:
I used to be pretty into nootropics , but this kind of advanced working memory training has got to be the only thing that ever gave me what I was looking for.
When I’m in lectures I can hold so much more in my head, which helps me make connections and link things back to what I’ve already learned. I can study for much longer now; 8am-10pm with pretty high levels of focus. I have a lot more self control (which I chalk up to improved executive functioning). Previously, I would have got resentful of the amount of time spent studying and crashed with a bunch of junk food and Netflix. Instead I now run 4km in 14 mins every day and spend an hour in the gym 6 days a week.
Sometimes I forget the difference I’ve witnessed in myself, but it really is like night and day in so many areas of my life. That’s the great thing about general intelligence I suppose, it gives a general benefit.
What do you think? I’ll try to answer any questions.
