Although brain training games may not work (2 October, p 28), some types of structured cognitive training, usually but not exclusively computer-delivered, can improve working memory by increasing dopamine receptor density in the prefrontal cortex (Science, vol 323, p 800).
Indeed, specific cognitive training is the only known treatment for the cognitive deficits associated with schizophrenia, and there are comparable effects for several developmental and age-related disorders.
One must not get carried away by the negative results in a single well-publicised paper such as the one by Adrian Owen and his colleagues (Nature, vol 465, p 775), which found that an average of 10 minutes per day, three to four days per week of non-specific brain training, delivered as part of a UK television experiment, did not generalise to other cognitive tests. It is perhaps misleading to write that "no large, published trial has yet ...
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