Posit Science Corporation

Posit Science Corporation is an American company providing brain fitness software and services.[1]

Posit Science's press releases state that the company develops solutions aimed at specific target groups, then licenses the software to those involved in those groups. It also markets products directly to the general public.[2]

History

Originally known as Neuroscience Solutions Corporation, the company was founded in 2002 by neuroscientists Michael Merzenich and Henry Mahncke. It was renamed Posit Science Corporation in January, 2005.[1]

Between 2002 and 2011, the company received about $36 million in funding from venture capitalists and others. During that time, its customers and funding sources included the Department of Defense and the National Institutes of Health, as well as insurance companies Group Health Cooperative, The Hartford, and Allstate.[3]

Products

The company's flagship product is BrainHQ, a software package designed to improve memory, attention, mental processing speed, interpersonal skills, and overall intelligence. It can be played on a personal computer or an iPad.[4] Other products include Double Decision, a cognitive training game designed to improve brain function[5] and DriveSharp, focused on improving driving skills.[3]

Under development is a computer game that the company hopes will be the first software to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration for treating schizophrenia.[2]

Reception

A 2008 PBS documentary about brain fitness featured Posit Science and its co-founder Dr. Michael Merzenich. Major PBS donors were given copies of Posit Science's InSight program. At that time, the technology underlying InSight had been the subject of numerous randomized controlled trials and has been the subject of over twenty peer-reviewed articles in medical and scientific publications.[6]

Brain training software is an emerging field, and evidence of the broad applicability of its results is difficult to find. Many studies are poorly designed; papers in the field often report equivocal results and fail to impress skeptical reviewers. But a Brown University review of twenty such studies identified one controlled study of Posit Science's Brain Fitness Program, conducted by the Mayo Clinic, as exceptional. After eight weeks of training with the Posit Science program, subjects improved their memory by twice as much as those in the control group, experiencing about a four percent increase in their working memory and processing speed.[7]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Posit Science Corporation". Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  2. 1 2 Boytchev, Hristio (2013-02-18). "Trying to help schizophrenics with computer brain games". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  3. 1 2 Rauber, Chris (2011-06-02). "Posit Science changes CEOs, names Henry Mahncke chief executive". San Francisco Business Times. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  4. ↑ Dayton, Lily (2013-06-01). "If you're thinking of trying training". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  5. ↑ Reddy, Sumathi (2016-07-25). "Can This Brain Exercise Put Off Dementia?". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  6. ↑ "Posit Science Corporation Featured in New PBS Documentary". BioSpace.com. 2008-11-26. Retrieved 2016-08-06.
  7. ↑ Goodier, Robert (2009-07-01). "Do Brain Trainer Games and Software Work?". Scientific American Mind. Retrieved 2016-08-06.

External links

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