This would probably be easier for substances other than creatine; it needs to be taken in pretty large doses (5-10 grams, although some sources recommend an initial phase of up to 25 grams) to be effective, and it has a distinctive taste and odor. Unless you want to be swallowing ten or so 00 gel capsules a day...
I take it IV isn't practical?
Although, if Ryan hasn't tasted it before, finding something that also has a distinctive taste is better than nothing. That would be an interesting study to have (maybe someone has already done it): is there a bigger placebo effect if the taste is more distinctive?
Hi all, I'm doing 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.
Thoughts on how I can improve this?