Current Biology: Electrical stimulation of parietal lobes shown to improve math ability.
Researchers at Britain's Oxford University demonstrated for the first time that electrical stimulation of the brain improved performance in a series of mathematics assessments, and continued to do so half a year later.
Volunteers were given either a placebo or a one milliamp electrical stimulus from right to left, or vice versa, across the parietal lobe -- a brain area important for processing mathematics. The stimulus was administered for about 20 minutes each day,
The subjects were taught symbols that represented different numerical values, and timed to see how quickly and accurately they could complete a series of puzzles based on those symbols.
The results published in the journal Current Biology showed volunteers who were given the electrical stimulation from the right to the left parietal lobes performed best. Those stimulated from left to right did worse.
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