21 replies to this topic

[unisonus]

Is there a supplement that would improve my ability to make quick, split-second decisions and react to various stimuli?

[Shepard]

Electroencephalogr Clin Neurophysiol. 1997 May;102(5):401-13.
    Caffeine effects on perceptual and motor processes.
    Lorist MM, Snel J.

    University of Groningen, The Netherlands. m.m.lorist@ppsw.rug.nl

    The effects of a single dose of caffeine on specific information processing operations were examined by using a visual selective attention task in which subjects were asked to select between a left and right hand response on the basis of two different target letters. The target was presented on a predefined position in the visual field and was either presented alone or with flanker letters, calling for the correct, the incorrect or no specific response. A dose of 3 mg/kg body weight caffeine or lactose, dissolved in a cup of decaffeinated coffee, was administered double blind and deceptively to overnight abstinence coffee drinkers. Behavioural measures were supplemented by psychophysiological measures. The present results replicated the basic findings obtained in this paradigm. The results indicated that the time to localise the target decreased and response preparation started earlier after caffeine than after placebo. These caffeine effects did not interact with the time subjects spent on the task or with the reaction time distribution, which might be due to a high level of practice.

    PMID: 9191584 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Nutr Neurosci. 2002 Dec;5(6):433-42.
    A rapid effect of caffeinated beverages on two choice reaction time tasks.
    Durlac PJ, Edmunds R, Howard L, Tipper SP.

    Army Research Institute, Simulator Systems Research Unit, 12350 Research Parkway, Orlando, FL 32826, USA. pjdurlach@hotmail.com

    Though consumers of tea and coffee can report feeling beneficial subjective effects of consumption virtually immediately, tests for objective effects of caffeine immediately post-consumption have been rare. Two experiments examined caffeine's ability to influence reaction time in choice reaction time tasks, using a dose of caffeine typical of a cup of tea or instant coffee, and testing at short post-consumption delays. Two groups of participants were given 60 mg of caffeine, after overnight abstinence, either in a hot tea drink, or a hot water drink. Two control groups also received hot tea or water, but without caffeine. In Experiment 1, participants were given a keypress task before the drink (baseline), immediately after the drink, and 40 min after the drink. In Experiment 2, a touch-screen test was given either 1, 14, or 27 min post consumption. Caffeine was found to reduce the effect of a distracter on reaction time in the keypress test and to reduce reaction time in a component of the touch-screen task; however, in neither experiment were these effects significantly modulated by post-consumption delay length. Thus, the speed of caffeine's action on psychomotor performance was shown to be on the order of minutes.

    PMID: 12509073 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

[unisonus]

Thanks a lot, Shepard!

Anything other than caffeine?

[Kalepha]

Things could also depend on what your perceived choice sets are to begin with. For instance, if your choice sets involved stopping hockey pucks, you'd first probably defer to a goaltending coach and practice.

[unisonus]

Eirenicon,

Assume that I am practicing regularly.

[Kalepha]

Hmmm. . . that was in fact something I considered, but a cursory Google Scholar search only bore references to treat various types of dementia, and even then only with moderate results. Besides just recommending the obvious, standard, conservative hygienic techniques, I'd say that if choice sets possibly involved dodging bullets, we recognize that at some point searching for a supplement to improve reaction time is simply the wrong search.

[unisonus]

Eirenicon,

Aye.

I'm not looking to dodge bullets. More like:



Actually, those balls do fly like bullets sometimes! [lol]

[porthose]

repetition is probably the key (or one of the keys anyway) to improving reaction time and the reason i say that is because i've spent the last 25yrs training in karate where repetition of basic technique runs into the thousands of reps. its hard work but you are rewarded with reflexes that the average John Doe would find astonishing.

with repetition comes familiarity and with familiarity you then have the ability respond quickly and appropriately to a given crisis situation.

you could also try and train in something called 'controlled fatigue training'. this is where you try and mimic a competition environment in your training to your sport. simply, you would perform a 'big bang' exercise, perhaps repetitions of a clean & jerk and then immediately move to perform the technique with full concentration in your chosen sport. by fatiguing the body in this way, you learn to develop the ability to fully engage the mind so that it drives the physical body to perform at quite incredible athletic levels. its tough training even coming close to vomit material but then again how can you get good at something if you don't push yourself?

perhaps you could even try the caffeine in combination with the above...?

but eirenicon is correct in saying practice is the key and also correct in saying supplements won't give you the ability to dodge bullets.

[porthose]

Eirenicon,

Aye.

I'm not looking to dodge bullets. More like:



Actually, those balls do fly like bullets sometimes!  [lol]

i just saw the youtube flick. why not do a training routine like this:

rounds 1 - 3
clean & jerk x 10reps and immediately without resting move to performing
3 - 5 minutes of intense table tennis. rest about 2mins between rounds.

rounds 4 - 6
snatch x 10reps and immediately without resting move to performing
3 - 5 minutes of intense table tennis. rest about 2mins between rounds.

ive performed the above successfully by not doing table tennis but free sparring in preparation for the WASO (World All Styles Championships) last year on the Gold Coast in Australia. Won gold and silver in kata and kumite respectively in the 'old timers' - veterans division.

[unisonus]

Porthose:

Thank you. This is good advice. I already perform Olympic lifts, plyometrics, and uphill sprints (though not on the days I play). I practice regularly and eat well. Or, at least, I do all these things when I am well-organized. But I am particularly interested in supplementation.

[graatch]

Psychomotor and cognitive effects of piribedil,
a dopamine agonist, in young healthy volunteers
by
Schuck S, Bentue-Ferrer D, Kleinermans D,
Reymann JM, Polard E, Gandon JM, Allain H.
Laboratoire de Pharmacologie Experimentale et Clinique,
Universite de Rennes I - Faculte de Medecine,
CS 34317, 35 043 Rennes cedex, France.
Fundam Clin Pharmacol. 2002 Feb;16(1):57-65

ABSTRACT

Piribedil is a dopamine agonist acting on D2 and D3 central nervous system dopamine receptors. This drug has been administered to 12 young healthy male volunteers (age 22 +/- 2 years) according to a single center randomized, double-blind, two ways cross-over, placebo controlled trial, including a washout period of one week. Placebo and piribedil were administered by a single intravenous infusion over 2 h (3 mg). Psychomotor performance and cognitive functions were assessed through a standardized and computerized psychometric tests battery and a continuous electroencephalogram (EEG) mapping. Piribedil improved simple reaction time (P=0.02), immediate (P=0.045 and 0.004), and delayed free recall (P=0.05), dual coding test (P=0.02) and increased theta and fast beta waves on the EEG (P < 0.05 and 0.001, respectively). No deleterious effect was observed on the tests exploring attention and concentration via the other procedures. It is concluded that a single intravenous perfusion of piribedil 3 mg improves alertness and the information processing speed within the central nervous system, in healthy volunteer

[wootwoot]

adderall

[EmbraceUnity]

Theobromine in chocolate might have similar effects as caffeine, considering they are closely related. I drink a big cup of green tea w/ powdered cocoa every day.

[luminous]

progressive, is you daily green tea with cocoa hot or cold? Do you add a sweetener? Does it taste good at all or is it strictly for health? It doesn't sound too tasty, but I could be wrong.

[graatch]

adderall

Yep, dopaminergics in general. In a human test, while both improved reaction time, caffeine also increased hand shaking, while amphetamine actually reduced it.

[EmbraceUnity]

progressive, is you daily green tea with cocoa hot or cold? Do you add a sweetener? Does it taste good at all or is it strictly for health?  It doesn't sound too tasty, but I could be wrong.

I take it hot and add stevia. However, I have learned to love the taste of strong green tea and strong cocoa.

[rabagley]

I drink a big cup of green tea w/ powdered cocoa every day.
...
I take it hot and add stevia. However, I have learned to love the taste of strong green tea and strong cocoa.

Interesting. Do you know the fluoride content of the tea you're drinking? I've been a big tea drinker for many years, but recently throttled back to one cup a day when I learned about the increasing fluoride content of both Indian and Chinese teas.

So, green tea and cocoa (and stevia). Care to provide a more detailed recipe? I've got some raw cacao powder being shipped to me as I write this and I'd love some methods of incorporating it into my existing morning ablutions.

[biknut]

Acetyl L-Carnitine has helped me a lot.

[Krell]

I was thinking about trying a Nicotine patch to improve my tennis game:

J Neurosci. 2007 Mar 28;27(13):3477-89.
Nicotine enhances visuospatial attention by deactivating areas of the resting brain default network.
Hahn B, Ross TJ, Yang Y, Kim I, Huestis MA, Stein EA.Neuroimaging Research Branch, Intramural Research Program, National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Institutes of Health, Baltimore, Maryland 21224, USA. bhahn@intra.nida.nih.gov

Nicotine-induced attentional enhancement is of potential therapeutic value. To investigate the precise attentional function(s) affected and their neuronal mechanisms, the current functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study used an attention task in which subjects responded to stimuli of high (INT(high)) or low intensity presented randomly in one of four peripheral locations. Central cues of varying precision predicted the target location. In some trials, the cue was not followed by a target, allowing separate analysis of blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) responses to cue. Minimally deprived smokers underwent fast event-related fMRI twice: once with a nicotine patch (21 mg) and once with a placebo patch. Matched nonsmokers were scanned twice without a patch. Behaviorally, nicotine reduced omission errors and reaction time (RT) of valid and invalid cue trials and intra-individual variability of RT and did so preferentially in trials with INT(high). The BOLD signal related to cue-only trials, regardless of cue precision, demonstrated nicotine-induced deactivation in anterior and posterior cingulate, angular gyrus, middle frontal gyrus, and cuneus. These regions overlapped with the so-called "default network," which activates during rest and deactivates with attention-demanding activities. Partial correlations controlling for nicotine plasma levels indicated associations of deactivation by nicotine in posterior cingulate and angular gyrus with performance improvements under INT(high). Performance and regional activity in the absence of nicotine never differed between smokers and nonsmokers, ruling out a simple reversal of a deprivation-induced state. These findings suggest that nicotine improved attentional performance by downregulating resting brain function in response to task-related cues. Together with the selectivity of effects for INT(high), this suggests a nicotine-induced potentiation of the alerting properties of external stimuli.

PMID: 17392464 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

[coq10]

Psychomotor and cognitive effects of piribedil,
a dopamine agonist, in young healthy volunteers
by
Schuck S, Bentue-Ferrer D, Kleinermans D,
Reymann JM, Polard E, Gandon JM, Allain H.
Laboratoire de Pharmacologie Experimentale et Clinique,
Universite de Rennes I - Faculte de Medecine,
CS 34317, 35 043 Rennes cedex, France.
Fundam Clin Pharmacol. 2002 Feb;16(1):57-65

ABSTRACT

Piribedil is a dopamine agonist acting on D2 and D3 central nervous system dopamine receptors. This drug has been administered to 12 young healthy male volunteers (age 22 +/- 2 years) according to a single center randomized, double-blind, two ways cross-over, placebo controlled trial, including a washout period of one week. Placebo and piribedil were administered by a single intravenous infusion over 2 h (3 mg). Psychomotor performance and cognitive functions were assessed through a standardized and computerized psychometric tests battery and a continuous electroencephalogram (EEG) mapping. Piribedil improved simple reaction time (P=0.02), immediate (P=0.045 and 0.004), and delayed free recall (P=0.05), dual coding test (P=0.02) and increased theta and fast beta waves on the EEG (P < 0.05 and 0.001, respectively). No deleterious effect was observed on the tests exploring attention and concentration via the other procedures. It is concluded that a single intravenous perfusion of piribedil 3 mg improves alertness and the information processing speed within the central nervous system, in healthy volunteer

This is the best nootropic i've tried while playing video games.

[graatch]

Oh yeah? Do you have any further comments? I was probably going to get a chance to try it soon.

[coq10]

Oh yeah? Do you have any further comments? I was probably going to get a chance to try it soon.

Just wait an hour or so for it to kick in. The effect lasts well over 10 hours.