Category Archives: Willing Ways Articles

Do Brain-Changing Games Really Work?

Do Brain-Changing Games Really Work

A New Study Looked For Evidence of Cognitive Benefits & Brain Changes The promise of brain-changing games is hard to resist. Who doesn’t want to improve memory and thinking and have fun doing it? Especially as you grow older? That’s just what products like Lumosity, the computer-based brain training program, aim—and claim—to do. The game’s target skills[…]

There is a New Link Between Screen-Time & Autism

There Is a New Link Between Screen-Time and Autism

Too Much Exposure, Especially in Boys, May Stunt Social Development Brains at every age, especially developing ones, adapt to the environment in which they find themselves. What worries a growing number of advocates are the potential risks of heavy screen exposure, including, they believe, the hastening of autism in the young and attention deficit–hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in older children. Richard[…]

How to Win The Smartphone-Brain Battle

How to Win the Smartphone-Brain Battle

New Research Explains How To Beat Brain Hackers At Their Own Game A 60 Minutes story aired on April 9focused on how Silicon Valley is engineering your smartphone, apps, and social media platforms to get you hooked. The gist was that programmers are aware of what they need to do to make your brain addicted to their creations—and that they[…]

The Anxiety Epidemic

The Anxiety Epidemic

Our Smartphones May Be a Major Cause On June 11, a New York Times article, “An Anxious Nation,” chronicled how our society has seemingly become one where the diagnosis of anxiety now rivals that of depression. Poignantly the article suggests that “Anxiety is starting to seem like a sociological condition, too: a shared cultural experience that feeds on alarmist CNN graphics and metastasizes through[…]

Early Diagnosis of Alcoholism

Early Diagnosis of Alcoholism

An important Clue Alcoholism is defined usually as the abuse of alcohol to the extent that it interferes with physical health and with the social aspects of life, including work. It is compulsive and potentially addictive. It can be present in different ways. Some individuals never drink during the day, but drink every night to the point of oblivion. Others[…]

Video Game Addiction

Video Game Addiction

Video Games Create Addictions Akin to Drug Addiction If you don’t think kids get hooked on video games, think again. If you Google “video game addiction,” you will find more than a dozen pages of Web sites dealing with this issue. There are also many pages of formal research papers found via a search on Google[…]

Teach Your Teen About Alcohol

Teach Your Teen About Alcohol

One In Five Teens Will Get Into a Car With A Driver Who Has Been Drinking You might think high school drinking is probably harmless. But consider these numbers. In a 2015 survey of U.S. high schoolers by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 18 percent reported downing five or more drinks in a two-hour stretch—in other words,.binge drinking. Almost[…]

Stress & Addiction

Stress and Addiction

Chronic Stress Can Increase Vulnerability to Addiction Stress is a key risk factor in addiction initiation, maintenance, relapse, and thus treatment failure (Sinha & Jastreboff, 2013). Stressful life events combined with poor coping skills may impact the risk of addiction through increasing impulsive responses and self-medication. While it may not be possible to eliminate stress, we[…]