186 Education Research Journal Vol. 2(6): 186 – 198, June 2012 Available online at http://resjournals.com/journals/educational-research-journal.html ISSN: 2026-6332 ©2012 International Research Journals Full Length Research Paper Lumosity training and brain-boosting food effects on learning Kpolovie, Peter James Department of Psychology, Guidance and Counselling, Faculty of Education, University of Port Harcourt Author‟s Email: drkpolovie@yahoo.com, peter.kpolovie@uniport.edu.ng, Tel: +2348088061666. Abstract This randomized six-group experimental study investigated the effects of lumosity training, and brain-boosting food on students’ learning, in order to proffer optimum functional or workable solution to the ever fresh question of how learning could best be improved. Seventy-two randomly drawn subjects and four treatments cum two control conditions were randomized into six groups of 4 treatments and 2 controls of 12 each. For six weeks that the experiment lasted, while one of the experimental brain-boosting food groups received brain-boosting food (salmon, mackerel and sardines, that are rich in omega-3 essential fatty acids as well as blueberries, mangoes plus watermelon that are antioxidant), the other received suitable dose of brain-boosting food supplements (ginkgo biloba and folic acid), while eating normal food. While one of the two lumosity training groups exercised the brain with it for 15 minutes twice a day, the other did for 30 minutes twice daily; each preceding a two-hour prep time. The control groups’ members of course, were accorded no treatment. Results showed positive significant effects of lumosity training and brain-boosting food on learning as subjects in each of the treatment groups learned significantly better than their counterparts in the control groups. Consequently, brain- enhancement exercise with lumosity training, and eating of brain-boosting food were recommended. Keywords: Lumosity training, brain-boosting food, learning, learning enhancement, randomized six-group experimental design. Introduction Man‟s activities are centred on learning. He acts both as a demonstration of his learned experiences and as a process for learning of new experiences. Every human institution that one could think of, emanated from learning, operates by learning and is aimed at learning, in one way or the other. In fact, the most central phenomenon in human life can rightly be said to be learning. The desire to express learning and to acquire more of it both consciously and unconsciously is infinitely endless. No individual has learnt maximally and none perhaps, could ever do so; yet to maximally learn in a perfectly unforgettable manner is doubtlessly the ultimate goal of all humans (Kpolovie, 2010a; 2007; 2005; 2003; 1999; Kosemani & Kpolovie, 2003). Learning is operationally defined as the complex synergy of cognitive, affective, psychomotor and environmental experiences and other influences for the acquisition, maintenance, organization, reorganization and enhancement of changes in an individual‟s behaviour, knowledge, skills, values, personality and world views for better resolution of problems as measured by the Experimental Learning Test of this investigation. Each problem so resolved, is itself a relevant piece of learning that adds to the complex whole and better prepares the individual for further acquisition and organization of knowledge to produce yet a more intelligent behaviour in overt or covert problem resolution. Learning has been and will continue to remain a central topic not only amongst psychologists but humanity, and its provocative nature has occasioned hundreds of theories and thousands of experimental studies. This particular experiment of the effects of Lumosity training and brain-boosting food on learning was anchored on the various theories of learning/memory enhancement, constructivism in particular, as memory of a given learning experience is a necessary precondition for it to be learnt. The concern on how to enhance learning has been so uppermost in the human mind and endeavour. Incredibly