Richard Gottlieb

Old Ladies, Red Bull and Games

“We play for blood,” says Ruth Cummins, 92, before taking a sip of Red Bull at a recent game.”  That’s the sentence that caught my eye in a recent New York Times article entitled “At the Bridge Table, Clues to a Lucid Old Age.”

There has been, for some time now, a growing body of evidence that game playing keeps a person mentally agile. For example, “The Nun Study” found that there was a direct link between doing cross word puzzles and not getting Alzheimer’s.  

What interested me about this article was a link noted between the social aspects of playing games with other people and staying mentally alert. Researchers are looking at mentally acute people 90 and over in order to see what makes them that way. 

The article quotes Dr. Claudia Kawas, a neurologist at the University of California, Irvine as saying: “We think … that it’s very important to use your brain, to keep challenging your mind, but all mental activities may not be equal. We’re seeing some evidence that a social component may be crucial.”

The article goes on to state that “[t]he evidence suggests that people who spend long stretches of their days, three hours and more, engrossed in some mental activities like cards may be at reduced risk of developing dementia. But some researchers argue that mental engagement — doing crossword puzzles, reading books — may delay the arrival of symptoms. And social connections, including interaction with friends, may be very important, some suspect.”

As I continue to explore the individual and social impact of play, I become more and more convinced that, from childhood through old age, it is the key and consistent component in maintaining a healthy, happy mind.

Scrabble and a Red Bull anyone?

Posted by Richard Gottlieb on May 28, 2009 | Comments (0)