The Internet is undeniably part of our lives, but did you know that its usefulness extends beyond its search capabilities? A study conducted by University of California Los Angeles scientists revealed that the Internet triggers key centers in the part of the brain that controls decision-making and complex reasoning in middle-aged people and other adults.

The results of the study are of particular importance on how people might improve brain performance, the UCLA researchers revealed. Dr. Gary Small, professor at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, explained that the results encourage us to hope that emerging technologies may have physiological effects and potential benefits for middle-aged and older adults.”

Scientists know for a fact that as individuals go through life, the brain goes through some changes as well, and that with age, brain function suffers a decline in performance, due to a reduction in cell activity, atrophy, or an increase in deposits of amyloid plaques and tau tangles, which strongly influence the cognitive function.

The team of researchers reached the conclusion that as long as we keep the brain stimulated with activities, we should be able to prevent it from losing its cognitive ability and help it preserve its health. The Internet seems to be the new crossword puzzle for adults, and this is just the beginning, as scientists now start to understand more of the benefits of technology on an aging brain.

The study, which will appear in the next issue of the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, and is also detailed in Dr. Small’s latest book, “iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind,” involved 24 volunteers, aged 55 to 76, all neurologically normal. While half of the participants had experience in searching the Internet, the other half had no such experience.

The participants were asked to perform Web searches, as well as book-reading tasks, while being monitored with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans for changes in brain circuitry.

While book-reading stimulated brain activity in all participants, in the regions of the brain that control language, reading, memory and visual activities, the Internet searches made a distinction between the two groups, by also stimulating activity in the frontal, temporal and cingulated areas of the brain, which control decision-making and complex reasoning.

Web searches were found to influence a twofold increase in brain activation in people using the Internet, compared to volunteers with no Internet experience. Researchers reported that Internet-experienced volunteers sparked 21,782 voxels (the tiniest measurable unit of brain activity registered by the fMRI) during Internet searching, compared to just 8,646 voxels in people with no Internet experience.

“Our most striking finding was that Internet searching appears to engage a greater extent of neutral circuitry that is not activated during reading,” Dr. Small explained, “but only in those with prior Internet experience. […] A simple, everyday task like searching the Web appears to enhance brain circuitry in older adults, demonstrating that our brains are sensitive and can continue to learn as we grow older.”

The UCLA team of researchers promised to address in future studies both the positive and negative effects that technology may have on the brain of aging individuals.