1. Not getting enough sleep
This phenomenon, familiar to anyone, is becoming a global problem. According to the WHO, over the past 100 years, people began to sleep an average of 20% less. Severe lack of sleep creates the risk that different parts of the brain move into a phase of slow wave sleep in the state of wakefulness. As a result, a person can’t concentrate and his fine motor skills deteriorate. The regular lack of sleep leads to brain cell death.
2. Lack of breakfast
Skipping the morning meal affects the performance and energy of the person during the day. It seems obvious, but the point here is not so much the consumption of energy necessary for the body, but the fact that lack of breakfast lowers the level of sugar in the blood. This in turn reduces and hinders the flow of nutrients to the brain.
3. Sugar
The preceding paragraph explains why it is recommended to eat sweets, expecially dark chocolate, to have a good brain performance. However, excessive amounts of sugar cause problems with the assimilation of protein and nutrients. It leads to the same result as the low, level of blood sugar: the brain does not receive enough nutrients.
4. Stress
Severe emotional stress weakens the connections between neurons and thus complicates the understanding of cause-effect relationships and sequence of events. Strong nervous excitement, poor memory and the feeling that everything goes wrong are also linked to stress.
5. Tranquilizers and sleeping pills
The use of sleeping pills and popular tranquilizers such as Xanax can impair memory up to amnesia, cause dementia and obsessive suicidal thoughts.
6. Smoking
Speaking about the negative effects of smoking on the body, the image of black lung and damaged teeth first comes to mind. At the same time, It is not said much about how cigarettes affect the brain: nicotine narrows its vessels. Besides the problems associated with lack of nutrients in the brain, this greatly increases the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
7. Lack of Sun
Lack of sufficient sunlight directly affects cognitive abilities. First, ultraviolet light produced from sunlight regulates blood circulation, that is, the flow of oxygen and nutrients. Second, sunlight helps produce serotinin – the hormone that affects a person’s mood.
8. Lack of water
Lack of water causes a decrease in brain volume, which considerably reduces its efficiency and leads to almost zero ability o memorize information. It is recommended to drink an average of 1,5-2 liters of water per day.
9. Too much information
Year after year, the amount of information to digest increases enormously. This would seem quite useful for the brain exercise and the maintenance of its performance. However, brain responds to such an information excess with resistance. It is expressed in the fact that at a certain moment the information is no longer absorbed causing up to memory lapses.
10. Multitasking
Another anomaly of the information world: people simultaneously process multiple streams of information. As a consequence, non of them is absorbed properly, and the mind gets used to this way of working. Information is perceived superficially, while being focused and doing one thing without frequent change of activity is becoming more difficult.