Modafinil Has the Potential to Make You Smarter

Modafinil Has the Potential to Make You Smarter

Modafinil is a smart pill that is typically used to treat sleep disorders such as narcolepsy.

Research has found that it can boost your cognitive function if you take it at the right dosage and for the correct length of time. It can help you focus and learn, increase your creativity, and improve your executive function.

Boosts Alertness

In a study of 554 patients, the Modvigil 200 Australia in Narcolepsy Multicenter Study Group found that the smart pill boosts subjective and objective measures of wakefulness.

Similarly, single doses of modafinil 200mg improve performance on various tasks in healthy adults undergoing sleep deprivation or simulate night shifts. These effects were comparable to caffeine and amphetamine.

The arousal-promoting effects of modafinil are thought to be mediated primarily by activity in catecholamine systems, although some evidence suggests that GABA receptors may also contribute. A recent report find that a single dose of 200 mg of modafinil (during sleep loss) reduced errors on the Wisconsin Card Sort Test and interference on the Stroop test, compared to a placebo.

Boosts Memory

If you’ve ever wanted to boost your brain power, it turns out that modafinil might be just the ticket. This smart pill has been shown to help people with conditions like narcolepsy and sleep apnea improve their memory and focus without the caffeine or nicotine-related side effects.

While a few other chemicals have been used to enhance cognitive performance, modafinil is the only one that has successfully passed rigorous tests for its effectiveness and safety in healthy adults.

A randomized, placebo-control study of 60 adults found that modafinil improved performance on digit span (forwards and backward), visual recognition memory, spatial planning, and SSRT. In addition, modafinil slowed latencies and increased accuracy on a number of measures, including Delayed Match-to-Sample and a Tower of London task.

Boosts Learning

Modafinil has the potential to make you smarter.

Think of it this way: You’re in class, and the professor is droning on about something you don’t understand. You’re just about to nod off when suddenly your brain wakes up and you start thinking about the subject.

In a study on mice, modafinil improves the learning of a serial spatial reversal task, boosting the ability to adopt a context-appropriate response. The effect was dose- and delay-dependent.

Activation in a brain region calls Brodmann area 17 (BA17) also increases after taking modafinil, suggesting that the smart pill may boost neural function in regions important for learning and cognitive control. This could explain why MA-dependent subjects improved their learning performance with modafinil, even if they had performed worse under placebo conditions.

Boosts Creativity

Modafinil is a wakefulness-enhancing smart pill that does use to treat sleepiness caused by narcolepsy and obstructive sleep apnea. It does also use to help people who work shift schedules stay awake during the day.

A new study, however, finds that it can actually make you smarter. Particularly when it comes to tasks that require “higher level” brain functions. This includes things like planning and decision-making, flexibility, learning and memory, and creativity.

In a double-blind, placebo-control parallel design, 32 non-sleep-deprived volunteers took 200 mg of modafinil or placebo. They performed non-verbal tests of divergent and convergent thinking. They also took a new test of task motivation and more difficult neuropsychological tests from the CANTAB battery.

Boosts Executive Function

Modafinil can boost your brain’s higher-order cognitive function without causing serious side effects. This works by increasing dopamine levels in the striatum, which is responsible for cognitive enhancement.

Does not have the same stimulant properties as caffeine or d-amphetamine.

In a double-blind trial of 200 mg of modafinil or placebo in 19 schizophrenia patients. Modafinil increases ID/ED performance (the ED shift is a form of attentional set-shifting. That depends on lateral PFC activation) during a visual discrimination learning task (Spence et al, 2005).

However, these findings should not be taken as evidence that modafinil directly activates the DAT or other central DA systems. These effects are likely to be due to the down-regulation of D2 and D3 receptors and changes in affinities.

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