Brain health after 40: what does a better score show?

Text written with the help of AI.

In a 2024 neurofeedback study, older adults receiving genuine feedback learned to change a targeted EEG pattern. The researchers did not detect a corresponding improvement on their cognitive assessments. The signal changed; the benefit people might hope for remained unproven. Andrade and colleagues, 2024.

That distinction matters when a device offers a brain score, a trial reports better test results, or a treatment slows clinical decline. Each finding answers a different question.

What an EEG change establishes

An EEG records electrical activity. Neurofeedback uses that activity to give someone visual or auditory feedback as they practise influencing a selected pattern. Changing the pattern shows that training affected the measured signal. It does not, on its own, show better memory or a lower risk of dementia.

Myndlift markets EEG-based “Brain Snapshots” that users can compare around activities such as coffee, exercise or supplements. Its product description explains what the score is intended to show; it is not evidence that improving the score protects cognition.

The company’s 2022 retrospective study reported improvements in symptom questionnaires and an attention-related task among users assessed before and after neurofeedback. The published system used visual and auditory feedback. But the study had no control group, participants may also have received other treatments, and the authors disclosed consultancy or employment relationships with Myndlift. The findings cannot isolate the effect of neurofeedback or establish prevention of cognitive ageing in healthy adults over 40.

A randomised study published in 2026 offers a more demanding comparison. It assigned 92 cognitively healthy adults aged 65 to 75 to genuine motor-imagery neurofeedback, sham feedback or conventional cognitive stimulation over ten weeks. All groups also had weekly physical activity sessions. Some participants regulated the targeted activity, but cognitive improvements were not specific to genuine neurofeedback. This tests one protocol, not every device; it shows why successful signal training and useful cognitive transfer must be assessed separately.

When a trial measures clinical decline

The Clarity AD trial tested lecanemab in 1,795 people with early Alzheimer’s disease. Over 18 months, average worsening on the Clinical Dementia Rating, Sum of Boxes was 1.21 points with treatment and 1.66 with placebo, a between-group difference of 0.45 points. The scale incorporates cognition and functioning, with higher scores indicating greater impairment.

Unlike a changed EEG signal alone, this is evidence of slower average clinical decline in the population studied. Both groups worsened. The result does not show restored memory, a cure, or protection for cognitively healthy adults in midlife. Harms also belong in the same account: amyloid-related imaging abnormalities involving swelling or fluid accumulation occurred in 12.6% of treated participants.

Prevention requires its own evidence. The AHEAD 3-45 programme tests lecanemab before symptoms; its A45 trial assesses change in a cognitive composite, while A3 assesses amyloid accumulation. The existence of those trials shows that prevention is being investigated, not that it has been demonstrated.

What a better cognitive test score can show

Lifestyle research can measure cognition more directly than an EEG score without settling every question about daily life or dementia. In the 2025 US POINTER trial, 2,111 adults aged 60 to 79 at increased risk of cognitive decline joined either a structured lifestyle programme or a less intensive, self-guided one. Both addressed physical activity, diet, cognitive and social engagement, and cardiovascular health monitoring.

Over two years, the structured group improved more on a composite cognitive score. The between-group difference was 0.029 standard deviations per year: statistically significant, but small. The trial did not have sufficient statistical power to determine an effect on dementia diagnoses. It also cannot identify which programme element produced the difference.

That result supports a claim about the tested programme and cognitive measure in those participants. It does not provide someone in their forties with a personal forecast of dementia risk reduction. Whether the difference persists or translates into everyday functioning remains a separate question.

Use a score for the question it can answer

A score may help you observe a change, but its usefulness depends on the purpose. If you are considering neurofeedback to improve attention, the relevant question is whether attention improves in situations that matter to you, beyond any movement in the device’s reading. Personal observations can inform whether an activity seems worthwhile; they cannot establish that it prevents dementia or works for others.

Persistent difficulties with familiar tasks, managing bills or conversation call for professional assessment rather than more self-tracking. The US National Institute on Aging advises discussing concerning changes in memory or thinking with a doctor.

Before paying for a programme on the promise of brain protection, check whether its evidence measures the ability you want to preserve in a relevant population. Where it measures only an EEG signal or short-term task performance, the claim should stay within those bounds.

Sources