Posit Science challenges BBC study on cognitive training programs

Posit Science, the leader in clinically proven brain fitness programs, contests the interpretation and methodology used in a British Broadcasting Corporation-sponsored study published in the journal Nature.

Researchers in the BBC study found that their own cognitive training programs, designed specifically for their study, did not yield significant improvements in cognitive function. They suggest from this finding that all cognitive training programs do not work. The authors failed to explain scores of other published studies, involving thousands of participants and duplicated at numerous study sites, that showed certain cognitive training programs do deliver improvements in cognitive function and in multiple measures of everyday life.

"This is a surprising study methodology," said Dr. Henry Mahncke, VP Research at Posit Science. "It would be like concluding that there are no compounds to fight bacteria because the compound you tested was sugar and not penicillin."

"There is a fatal flaw in the BBC study; it assumes that since their methods did not work, all methods would not work," said Steven Aldrich, CEO Posit Science. "Posit Science has built products that have been rigorously tested by researchers at many leading research institutions including the Mayo Clinic, Johns Hopkins, and the University of Southern California. Those studies have shown real-world improvements including improved memory and attention, greater functional independence and better quality of life."

In recent years, more than 60 articles have been published in peer-reviewed journals on Posit Science technology, and have repeatedly shown benefits that apply to everyday life, including improvements in:

• Generalized, untrained measures of memory and attention
• Everyday cognitive tasks
• Health-related quality of life
• Functional independence
• Mood and affect
• Feelings of control and autonomy
• The safer operation of a car

These benefits were demonstrated in leading medical and science journals, including publications in Journal of the American Medical Association, the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society and the Journal of Gerontology. A more complete list of studies can be found at www.positscience.com/studies.