Tuesday, May 25, 2010
I tried to tell my mom this....
but she didn't believe it.
News item: Playing in the dirt may make you smarter
(Actually my parents didn't object to my playing in the dirt. They wanted to have me outside as much as possible, which was eminently sane and sensible for both kids and adults. I just felt the need for a jokey caption.) ¶ 1:00 PM
News item: Playing in the dirt may make you smarter
A new study finds that naturally occurring bacteria in soil could enhance learning. And as a side benefit, it appears to be a natural anti-anxiety drug, but without the side-effects.
In studies presented Monday at the 110th general meeting of the American Society for Microbiology in San Diego, mice exposed to Mycobacterium vaccae navigated a maze twice as fast, and with less anxiety, as control mice.
In a second experiment the bacteria were removed from the diet of the experimental mice and they were retested. While the mice ran the maze slower than they did when they were ingesting the bacteria, on average they were still faster than the controls.
"The learning that occurred was profound," said Dorothy Matthews of The Sage Colleges in Troy, New York, who conducted the research with her colleague Susan Jenks.
Matthews said it's interesting to speculate that creating learning environments in schools that include time outside where M. vaccae is present may decrease anxiety and improve the ability to learn new tasks.
(Actually my parents didn't object to my playing in the dirt. They wanted to have me outside as much as possible, which was eminently sane and sensible for both kids and adults. I just felt the need for a jokey caption.) ¶ 1:00 PM
