Tests have shown that a cup of tea can significantly reduce your anxiety levels.

The research was led by Dr Malcolm Cross at the City University London. The experiment placed people in a stressful situation, and those who didn’t receive tea immediately after the test showed a 25% increase in anxiety! And those who were given tea showed a 4% reduction in stress.

So the British tradition has the backing of science. After that hard day at work keep up the tea ritual!

Source: TPA.

Last week I wrote about the brain training I was going to try out with the use of a book called Brainstumpers.

In total the book housed 85 different puzzles to complete, having now completed it and added up my scores I managed 45/85, or 53% correct. I have to admit I found it very tough. Although only getting half right sounds a bit dumb I’m actually very pleased with it. Although I’m pleased with my score, there is also a lot of room to improve, which is great.

Certain types of questions I was good at, others I just couldn’t do to save my life! No matter how often they popped up I could never figure out how you worked out the answer. Without knowing the method all you can do is guess. Thankfully though I didn’t get very lucky on the guess front because that would have given a flattering score.

Here is an example of the kind of question I got stuck on:

I’m not going to tell you the answer, or even give you a clue. To be honest looking at the answer, I would never have got it no matter how long I thought about it. If you are desperate for the answer you are welcome to email me!

There is no doubt how hard you have to think to solve such puzzles, you really have to work your mind in a variety of different ways to solve all the different kinds of puzzles.

I’m going to keep doing similar exercises to see how much I can improve. So does it work? I think there is no doubt, it gets you thinking in a way you don’t have to in general life. Personally the extent to which it works (IE how much I improve) will only be known long-term. But I highly recommend you try something like this as it can be fun, and improves you brain at the same time!

If you want to buy the brainstumpers books they are available on Amazon for around £6 (at the time of writing). And they also have a lot more Puzzle and solution type books on Amazon so it’s worth checking out.

My health body, healthy mind quest continues…

Image credit: Multivitamin.co.uk own scan

According to new scientific research Vitamin D can help reduce the risk of multiple sclerosis. The research suggests that a Vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy and childhood increases the risk of a child developing multiple sclerosis.

So in short, lets start giving daily Vitamin D supplements to pregnant women and young children and in the future the number of people diagnosed with MS should drop. Obviously it’s not as simple as that and it will be down to the individual parent to start taking the supplements.

Boosting levels in the womb and early in life could cut MS cases by upto 80%, or 2,000 of the 2,500 cases diagnosed each year in the UK.

Vitamin D is produced by the sun’s rays reaching the skin, so if you live in colder climates like Scotland which has one of the highest rates of MS in the world, you are more at risk. And if you are reading this from Spain, well I’m very jealous, but also you are at a much lower risk.

The research was carried out by George Ebers, Professor of Clinical Neurology at the University of Oxford.

Stat Sources: Dailymail, Times. Image: sxc

Some interesting research has been done linking sleep to getting the common cold.

A study of 153 men and women aged 21 to 55 found that people who sleep less than 7 hours per night were about 3x more likely to get a cold than people who slept 8 hours or more per night.

Sheldon Cohen who headed the study said “People whose sleep was disturbed were much more likely to develop colds than people who went to sleep, slept all night, and got up in the mornings”.

The researchers don’t yet know why less sleep is connected to susceptibility to common colds. To be honest I’m not massively bothered why, I’m just going to make sure I get lots of good sleep so I don’t get any more colds!

The study was headed by Sheldon Cohen, psychology professor at Carnegie Mellon University. It was published Monday Jan 12th in Archives of Internal Medicine.

Source: cnn. Image: caitlinator

Research lef by Professor Howard Friedman has found that hard work and good self-discipline can lead to a longer and healthier life.

Type Of Person – Length Of Life
People who are ambitious and have a hunger for work are likely to live up to 4 years longer than those with less apetite for work (the more free-spirited type of people). An incredible stat which shows just how much your lifestyle effects your length of life.

Type Of Person – Happiness in Life
The study also shows that those people who are well disciplined and very achievement-oriented are happier than those less well disciplined and focused on achieving things.

Why Is This So?
Those people who are more focused and achievement oriented generally don’t drink or take drugs which has obvious health benefits.

The study was published in the American Psychological Association’s journal Health Psychology.

Sources: DailyMail, Guardian, Telegraph
Image credit: alfinaldeesteviaje