Hi all, I’m deciding a method for my first quantified self experiment. How does this design sound to you?
Metrics
• 20 min sample of tests from Cambridge brain sciences site: spatial span, double trouble, object reasoning, rotations, hampshire tree task, spatial slider.
• 10 USMLE Rx questions in 11 mins covering neurology, psychiatry, cognitive sciences and epidemiology, randomised from a pool of 400 questions.
• Subjective report of cognitive ability from one to ten.
These will be taken daily at noon.
Intervention
• Take nothing for one week.
• Take creatine 5g daily for two weeks
• Then take nothing for two weeks
I’m starting with creatine because I’m vegetarian. Then I’ll report my findings, re-evaluate value of further experiments and proceed on to some or all of piracetam+choline, Luminosity and dual n-back.
A longer baseline (before starting creatine) would help. Due to learning, you will surely get faster at the Cambridge tests. As time passes, the improvement due to learning will become more and more linear – thus more and more easily adjusted for.
When you do the creatine, it would be better to continue that phase until you have two weeks of constant scores – until the effect stops changing, in other words. Maybe the creatine takes several days to reach its full effect. There is no need to set in advance how long you will do it.
Nor do you need to set in advance how long the final period will be. Maybe the creatine takes several days to wear off.