A new study from the University of Michigan reveals the value of socializing for enhancing brain fitness. The study will be published in February 2008, but you can access a podcast below, with Oscar Ybarra, a UM psychologist and study author.

The study, conducted in 2 parts, associated social activity with increased performance on cognitive tests. The authors evaluated a few thousand people for the time they spent socializing with friends, family and colleagues. They found that increased socializing time predicted better performance on cognitive tests, including working memory.

This part of the study, like many human studies, can’t say that increased socializing actually makes you smarter. It may be that people who do better on those tests are just more likely to socialize and that there is no causative relationship.

However, the second part of the study addressed this question. In this part, researchers divided volunteers into three groups. The first group spent ten minutes socializing before taking a test. The second group played mentally challenging games for ten minutes preceding the test. The third group watched ten minutes of ‘Seinfeld’ prior to the test.

The results showed that socializing worked as well as mentally challenging games on improving test performance. They were both better than watching TV (of course another interpretation is that socializing and mind games do nothing but Seinfeld makes you dummer, sorry Jerry).

In any case, this supports the notion that socializing may be causative for improving mental performance, at least in the short term. It would be interesting to see what the long-term brain boosting benefits are.

Other studies in the past have also correlated increased social support networks with reducing stress and maintaining brain function.

The bottom line? Get involved in life. Interacting with other people helps you keep your brain running sharp.

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