Author: Ralph

life. coffee. stories.

Noise on Cognitive Health

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Have you ever felt you could focus better and enter your flow state when working in a cafe? You may have noticed that it might be the background noise in the cafe that helped you stay focused. But have you also felt stressed by a loud background noise, like the drilling sound from a construction site nearby? Today, we will explore the impact of noise – especially those we are exposed to in urban areas – on our cognitive health!

What Are Noise Levels?

Noise levels are measured by decibels (dB). According to the US Centers for Disease, Control and Prevention (CDC), the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the World Health Organization (WHO) recommend maintaining a noise level below 70 dB over 24 hours to prevent noise-induced hearing loss. Listening to loud music, going to concerts, or hearing sirens are some of the risky activities that could lead to hearing loss.

Just to get a sense of varying levels of dB, here are some examples. Your typical breathing sound is approximately 10 dB, a soft whisper is about 30 dB, and normal conversations have a sound level of 60 dB.

According to the CDC, at sound levels between 70 and 85 dB, you may feel annoyed, and above 85 dB, you may experience hearing loss after a prolonged exposure.

How Does Background Noise Affect Us?

It appears that depending on the noise level, we are affected differently. It appears that the quality of studies investigating the relationship between the exposure to a range of noise levels and cognitive function level generally has low quality. A 2022 systematic review study found that most of the studies on this topic were low-quality studies.

Having that said, there are some studies that indicate cognitive decline with exposure to the high noise level. A 2020 study has shown that an average increase of 10 dB increases the likelihood of cognitive decline and dementia.

In contrast, a 2022 experimental study showed at noise level less than 45 dB helped individuals to focus on their work. While a noise level of around 65 dB also helped with focus, it also increased stress.

A 2021 neuroimaging study using electroencephalography (EEG) explains that background noise affects stress, attention and mental load. Another 2019 EEG study showed that verbal/auditory attention decreases significantly when exposed to the noise levels above 90 dB. A 2013 study showed that children exposed to background noises may face challenges with learning, especially recalling verbal recalls.

Exposure to noise can increase stress hormone level, which may have negative consequences to cognitive health, too. Misophonia is a condition in which a person has increased irritability once hearing sounds like a chewing sound, is an example where noise can increase the stress level. Chronic stress can lead to a cognitive health decline.

What Can We Do About Background Noise?

Now that we have learned how exposure to noise affects our cognitive health, we will explore ways to reduce the noise level in our environment. The US CDC has a few recommendations:

  1. Use earplugs or earmuffs: earplugs have many benefits when sleeping. There are different types that you can choose to fit your needs. There are proper steps to using earplugs.
  2. Stay away from loud environments.
  3. Use devices that measure sound level. Smartwatches and smartphones may have apps and other functions to measure the environmental sound level.

Summary

Today, we explore how exposure to noises can affect our cognitive health. We found noise levels below 45 dB may be helpful for focus, but prolonged exposure to sound levels above 65 dB may increase stress levels that may be harmful. We also found that we could use smartwatches or smartphones to measure the environmental noise level and use earplugs to reduce the exposure. We hope this blog has helped you understand how noise affects our cognitive health!

Desert

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it’s like walking on a desert
waiting for the rain to fall
because there’s a cloud over
the head, but it does not at all

your body is drying up quickly
yet you continue this stubbornly hopeful
walk, and you just wait for that delicacy,
a long-waited salvage beyond the doubtful

yet when the sunsets
and a drop of a bird’s dung
splashes you of its ugly end
do not be bitter, but sing a song

the song of the hunger
the song of the adventurer
the song of the survivor.

6.16.2023

Darkest

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in my darkest hours,
I subtly noticed that I was alone.
only the silence and darkness
that felt like eternity remained.

thankfully, it is now pocketed
in the corner of my memory
and in the thickening of my skin
to withstand another tsunami

if you are in your darkest moment,
let me offer you my silent presence.
I will remind you that you’re not alone
and that I believe in your growth.

6.15.2023

Ease

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it didn’t matter then,
but I see it matters now;
just how important a simple thing as
being at ease can be.

as if we had all we needed,
as if we were the only ones in the universe,
as if nothing but just this moment existed,
I remember the soft smile.

as I see the grey sky above,
as I wake up again,
I try to remember
to bring such ease to others.

6.14.2023

Start

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the moment you have realized
you have far way to go to catch up
the race has started when you internalize
all the work you did does not match up
to your expected level of competency
for other to rely on you completely
it’s alright. take a deep breath.
one day at a time. all are within your reach

6.13.2023

Shell

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try recording yourself and watch it again.
if you haven’t been your best version,
you’ll notice all of your wrongdoings:
pride, selfishness, and ignorance.

that’s why we put the best effort every day.
to be not ashamed of yourself in the future;
to be able to say you did your best;
to look back and realized you tried your best
regardless of all the past mistakes you see.

so let’s give it all today
everyday is a new challenge.

6.12.2023

Cognitive Benefits of Walking in Nature

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Have you felt a sense of calm and relaxation when you walk around a garden, a park, or a forest? Especially in urban areas, green spaces give a sense of peace in the middle of chaotic urban life. Today, we will explore the benefits of walking in nature.

  1. Types of Nature
  2. What Are the Benefits of Walking in Nature?
  3. How Does Walking in Nature Help Cognitive Health?
  4. How Can We Increase Access to Nature?
  5. Summary

Types of Nature

Let’s first go over what we mean when we talk about nature. Compared to rural or suburban regions, urban areas often lack access to nature, such as trees, grass, and shrubs. In order to increase access to nature, local governments promote building infrastructure that supports community access. The types of such structures include:

  • Green Street: a type of street with perennials, shrubs, and trees to capture rain/stormwater and pollutants
  • Green Space: an open space in an urban setting, such as parks, community gardens, and green roofs.

If you are interested in looking up how much green space your neighborhood has, you can look up the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index, which captures the level of green space concentration in a region.

What Are the Benefits of Walking in Nature?

The National Institute on Aging cites a 2022 JAMA Network Open paper studying 13,000 middle-aged women between 2014 and 2016 by a team of researchers from Harvard University and Boston University who found that increasing residential space may be associated with cognitive benefits among middle-aged women. They found that women have higher scores on thinking speed, attention, and overall cognitive score, about 1.2 years younger.

Access to green space may benefit even those who are diagnosed with dementia. A 2020 mixed-review study suggests that there may be benefits for people with dementia to live in a community setting with access to green space and promote horticultural programs, such as green care farms and gardening. A 2018 UK study with 28 participants found that people with mid-late stage dementia experienced increasing mood improvement with increasing time spent in the garden up to 80 minutes.

More research could be funded to better understand the association between increased access to nature and cognitive health. A 2016 systematic review investigating the association between long-term green space exposure and cognition across the life course found a limited number of available studies, most of which were poor or fair quality. Perhaps this is a field that more researchers can investigate. Another 2019 study based on the Ginko Evaluation of Memory Study (GEMS) with 3048 participants found a moderate association between green space exposure and dementia progression among US adults aged over 75 years old.

Access to green space also appears to help young people, who may experience the benefit for a more extended period of their life. A 2017 systematic review of 12 articles studying the effect of green space and the mental well-being of children found that access to green space increases attention restoration, memory, self-discipline, and lower ADHD behaviors.

How Does Walking in Nature Help Cognitive Health?

One reason walking in nature helps with cognitive health could be because the vegetation in greenspaces can capture both air and water pollution. The greenspaces may help improve cognitive health by capturing air pollution, which reduces cognitive function levels.

Another reason that spending time in nature helps cognitive function is that it reduces the risk of depression. Studies have found that spending time in nature reduces the rate of depression. Having depression was also found to be a risk factor for cognitive decline and dementia.

There are a couple theories as to what might be happening to our minds when we walk in nature. The Attention-Restoration Theory (ART) hypothesizes that urban environments often have high levels of stimulation that lead to attention fatigue. Some suggested that being in the natural environment can alleviate attention fatigue. Another theory, the Stress Reduction Theory (SRT), hypothesizes that exposure to natural environments reduces physiological and psychological stress, leading to positive emotions.

Study results appear to support both theories. A 2022 EEG study with 63 participants found that walking in nature reduced amygdala activation after the walk in nature compared to walking in an urban environment. Another 2022 EEG study with 42 participants found that even walking while watching 6 1-minute videos of green urban spaces produced more calm, positive emotions.

How Can We Increase Access to Nature?

There could be ways to increase access to green spaces. Here are a few suggestions:

  1. Create mini-forests. A Japanese graduate student, Akira Miyawaki, found ways to grow trees, shrubs, and other plants native to Japan and successfully grew them in small patches of urban land.
  2. Use your building’s roof. Building a garden on your roof could help reduce energy use and create a space for the residents/office workers to rest.

Summary

In this post, we explored types of green space, how green space gives emotional and cognitive benefits, what could be mechanism that works, and how we can increase access to green space. If you have more ideas that you would like to share on how to increase green space, please comment below! We hope this post has helped you understand the importance of exposure to green space and building more of them.

Alcohol: Negative Cognitive Health Effect

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Drinking alcohol is prevalent in most cultures. Some claim that liquor is a social lubricant, allowing people to bond. But many would also attest to feeling they couldn’t walk straight, talk without slurred speech, or remember what happened the day after drinking alcohol. In this post, we will explore the potential long-term adverse effects of drinking liquor.

Please note depending on where you live, there may be an age limit (e.g., 21 years old if you live in the United States) on when you can legally purchase and drink alcohol.

What are Alcoholic Drinks?

Liquor is an alcoholic drink often produced by distilling fermented grains, fruits, or vegetables. Common types of liquor include beer, wine, and hard liquor, such as whiskey.

The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends 1 or fewer drinks in a day for women and 2 or fewer drinks in a day for men. A “drink” standard drinking size in the United States contains 14 grams (0.6 ounces or 1.2 tablespoons). This is equivalent to:

  • 12 ounces of 5% alcohol beer
  • 8 ounces of 7% wine
  • 1.5 ounces of 40%alcohol liquor.

The CDC defines binge drinking as drinking 4-5 or more drinks a day and heavy drinking as drinking 8-15 or more drinks per week. Binge drinking could lead to alcohol poisoning, a medical emergency from high blood alcohol levels because excessive drinking exceeds the body’s capacity to process alcohol.

Symptoms of alcohol intoxication include decreased judgment and control, slurred speech, reduced muscle coordination, vomiting, reduced consciousness and cognitive function, and coma.

What Are the Effects of Alcohol on Cognitive Health?

Heavy drinking was found to be associated with an increased risk of dementia. A 2018 longitudinal study in the United Kingdom following people’s alcohol consumption level for 23 years suggests that those who drank more than 14 drinks a week had an increased risk of dementia.

A 2019 systematic scoping review conducted on articles published between 2000 and 2017 suggests that heavy alcohol use was associated with changes in brain structures, cognitive impairments, and increased risk of dementia. A 2023 systematic review in Europe also found a similar effect: moderate to high alcohol consumption was associated with an increased risk of cognitive impairment, memory loss, and risk of dementia.

Another study conducted in 2019 with 785 individuals from the Jackson Heart Sleep Study suggests that evening drinking alcohol can impair sleep quality, which may lead to a high likelihood of memory impairment and other cognitive functions.

Other effects of drinking alcohol include:

  • Liver disease: fatty liver, cirrhosis, hepatitis, fibrosis, and liver cancer
  • Heart disease: arrhythmias, cardiomyopathy (enlarged heart), hypertension, stroke
  • Muscle loss: muscle waste (reduced muscle tissue)
  • Depression & Anxiety: higher likelihood of depression & anxiety
  • Obesity: increased likelihood of weight gain

Are There Benefits of Drinking Alcohol?

A moderate amount of drinking (1-2 drinks) was associated with a lower risk of dementia. Some studies suggest light drinking (drinking low alcohol content) can help with rehydration after a workout, but some studies produced evidence suggesting that it may impair muscle recovery.

In the early 2000s, discoveries were made that resveratrol, a chemical found in red wine, has an antioxidant property that may have an anti-aging effect in mice. However, the researchers also found that you would have to consume about 1000 bottles of wine in order to find a similar effect in humans.

Summary

We explored the effects of alcohol on our mind, body, and overall health. Drinking above the recommended amount of alcohol (1-2 drinks) was associated with an increased risk of cognitive decline. We hope this post has helped you learn some of the consequences of excessive drinking and help you have a healthy drinking life. Please drink (if you are legally allowed to) responsibly!

If you have an alcohol disorder or any other health concerns related to alcohol, please contact your physician or the SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration).