AdvertisementLifestyleHealth & wellnessHealth ‘Strength training for your brain’: This skill may keep you sharp as you age Richard Sima July 29, 2026 — 4:50pm Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Advertisement“If you are constantly using your brain for difficult, engaging and stimulating challenges, your brain will be healthier,” Bialystok said. How languages change the brain If you know several languages, your brain has them “on” all the time, even when you aren’t speaking them. For people who are bilingual, there are cortical areas in the brain’s language network that respond to both languages. In the study, published last year in Nature Ageing, they found that, across 27 European countries, countries with more spoken languages were associated with slower brain ageing.