珍妮•西尔斯多弗对各种分心的事情早已司空见惯。这位59岁的政府关系专家在俄亥俄州哥伦布市的全美互惠保险公司（Nationwide Insurance）工作，由于是开放的办公室环境，她想不听到邻近工作间同事的对话都难。

    但西尔斯多弗有个秘密武器：她已经花了不少时间在电脑上进行注意力训练，任务就是在屏幕上各类物体满天飞的干扰下保持一个虚拟篮球的平衡。

    她说：“我屏息凝神，对自己说‘专心，专心，再专心。’我在头脑中想象那个篮球，试图保持它的平衡。突然之间，我又重新进入了工作状态。”

    其它公司的员工只敢偷偷摸摸地玩纸牌游戏或者单词接龙，全美互惠保险公司反而鼓励西尔斯多弗去玩各种益智游戏，因为它们已经成为公司健身计划的组成部分。游戏套装名为“脑力培养方案”（My Brain Solutions），由脑力资源公司（Brain Resources ）制作。该软件旨在指导员工如何集中注意力和应对压力，从而提升工作效率和记忆力，增进积极思维，并达成其它增强脑力的目标。

    随着越来越多的职位需要脑力活动、创造力和交流技巧，员工仅仅坐在办公桌前已经远远不够了，他们还需要思维敏捷、情绪饱满、不受干扰。有人找到了一种解决方案：头脑训练。

    “我们发现大脑和肌肉很像。如果你锻炼它，它就会变得强健。大脑真的能够生成新的神经元，”脑力资源公司的CEO格雷戈里•拜尔说。“如果你教会大家如何优化管理那些压力重重的多任务环境，你就能够让他们保持（精神）健康。”

    “脑力培养方案”首先按四个维度来评估用户的头脑健康状况：情绪、思考、自律、感受。为了强化最弱的认知功能，软件将基于测试结果向用户推荐特定游戏。软件系统还能跟踪用户的进步，为游戏时间记点，当用户完成阶段成果时还会颁发勋章。

    来自密苏里州堪萨斯城的电子病历提供商塞内公司（Cerner Corporation）也在今年夏天引入了“脑力培养方案”，作为一个试点项目，面向美国国内约9,500名年轻而富进取心的员工提供支持。塞内公司最终可能将该项目提供给全球、包括印度在内的员工。寻求精神卫生保健在印度甚至是相当大的耻辱。

    “通常只有到了无法正常工作与生活的境地，人们才会去关注自己的精神健康；而那时他们多半已经患有精神疾病了，”塞内公司的副总裁兼首席医疗官戴维•尼尔称。“脑力资源公司让消费者得以随时随地进行头脑训练，而且还可以自己制定进度，无需他人干预。”

    短短两周之内就有1,000多名塞内公司员工报名参与该项目，当前用户达2,500人，超出了尼尔的预期。这是公司很感兴趣的重要领域，因为30%的塞内公司员及其家属有抑郁和焦虑这类行为健康问题，（每年的）相关医疗费用高达约200万美元。尼尔称，费用最高的病例是与压力相关的症状，占到塞内公司员工的约5%。

    Jeanne Siersdorfer is no stranger to distraction. The 59-year-old government relations specialist at Nationwide Insurance in Columbus, Ohio works in an open office environment where it's all too easy to latch onto cubicle neighbors' conversations.

    But Siersdorfer has a secret weapon: hours of computer time she's logged balancing a virtual basketball while other objects fly across the computer screen.

    "I catch myself and say, 'focus, focus, focus.' I visualize that crazy basketball and trying to balance it and the next thing I know, I'm back in my zone at work," she says.

    Unlike other office workers who may play solitaire or Words With Friends on the sly, Nationwide actually encourages Siersdorfer to play the basketball game, among others, and has made it a part of its wellness plan. The games, which are produced by a company called Brain Resources and part of a package called My Brain Solutions, aim to teach concentration and stress management techniques to boost executive function and memory, increase positive thinking, and achieve other brain-enhancing goals.

    As more and more jobs rely on knowledge work, creativity, and communication skills, it's not enough to have workers sitting at their desks -- they must also be mentally sharp, emotionally present, and free from distraction. The answer for some: brain training.

    "The brain, we're finding out, is much like muscles in the body. If you exercise it, it gets better. You actually grow neurons," says Gregory Bayer, chief executive of Brain Resources, which created My Brain Solutions. "If you can teach people how to manage those multitasking and stressful environments optimally, you're going to preserve their health."

    My Brain Solutions users begin with an assessment of their brain to provide a baseline along four axes: emotion, thinking, self-regulation, and feeling. Based on the resulting profile, the software suggests specific games to build up the areas of cognitive function that are weakest. The system tracks users' progress, giving points for playing time and badges when users reach milestones.

    Cerner Corporation, an electronic medical records provider based in Kansas City, Mo., introduced My Brain Solutions as a pilot program this summer, aiming to offer support to its young, hard-driving workforce of about 9,500 in the U.S. Cerner may eventually expand the program to its global workforce, including staffers in areas like India, where seeking mental health care comes with a considerable stigma.

    "Usually, people don't engage in this type of activity until they're not functioning well; they're headed toward a diagnosis," says David Nill, vice president and chief medical officer at Cerner. "Brain Resources brought on an ability for consumers to engage any time, any place, on their own terms without having to talk to anybody."

    Over 1,000 Cerner employees signed up for the program within the first two weeks and currently the company has 2,500 users, more than Nill anticipated. It's a key area of interest because behavioral health issues such as depression and anxiety affect 30% of Cerner's employees and family members and cost about $2 million in health expenses. The most expensive cases, which represent about 5% of Cerner's workers, involve stress-related conditions, according to Nill.

    “很久以来我就已经知道这类科学研究了。结果令人信服，”尼尔说。“这就是认知行为疗法；（通过这些游戏，）不必去见医生就能接受治疗。”

    杰西•赖特是路易斯维尔大学（University of Louisville）的精神病学教授，脑力资源公司在阐述该程序的科学基础的白皮书中就引用了他在计算机辅助认知疗法上的研究。他告诉我们，自助和认知行为疗法（CBT）的联系由来已久。

    “实施认知行为疗法的计算机程序得到广泛应用，可以帮助那些还没有患上精神疾病的人，认知行为疗法的实践策略在解决问题、管理压力等方面都有帮助，”赖特在给《财富》杂志（Fortune）的电子邮件中写道。“不过要注意的是，如果确实患有抑郁症这类精神疾病，很可能需要正规和精心设计的救助计划才能减轻症状。”

    全美互惠保险公司的案例研究发现：根据脑力资源公司收集的问卷回应，经常玩这些游戏的员工的积极思维增加了5%，社交技巧提升了8%，情绪韧性加强了9%。同样地根据员工的自我报告，由于生产率提升8%，而缺勤率下降7%，公司的盈利能力也得到实质性的提升。

    除去改进大脑功能的直接效益，这些游戏还能与各种保健项目共同作用，帮助员工实现其它健康目标，比如减肥、锻炼以及戒烟。除了在那些能帮助他们坚持计划的认知领域继续努力，员工还可以在“脑力培养方案”里设定目标，跟踪进度。

    “它与其它项目配合时效果最好，”全美互惠保险公司主管健康及生产率事务的副总裁凯瑟琳•赫拉斯说。“如果我想实施一个减肥计划，学习关于大脑激励机制和运作机制的知识将非常有助于我改变自己的行为。”

    “脑力培养方案”充满趣味的游戏氛围也帮助全美互惠保险公司实现了另一个目标：员工援助计划变得更具吸引力，不再让人羞于参与。2007年，公司的员工援助计划整体使用率虽然仅为7.7%，但已远超行业平均水平的4%。而在引入“脑力培养方案”后，员工援助计划的使用率在2011年跃升到了18.4%.

    赫拉斯称，公司更广泛的保健计划获得了更大成功，而“脑力培养方案”对此贡献匪浅。例如，公司的肥胖及超重员工的比率在2010年到2012年间都出现了下降。

    “2012年，公司有史以来第一次有超过70%的员工被划入低风险人群。而高风险人群的比率仅7%，为历史最低记录，”赫拉斯说。“这个项目独立运作的效果就已经不错了。和咨询配合起来也很好。从最健康的人甚至到最危重的病人，它对每个人都有用。”

    "I've been aware of the science for quite a while. It's very compelling," Nill says. "It's cognitive behavioral therapy; you're just doing it without them having to sit in a therapist's office."

    Self-help and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) have a long history with each other, according to Jesse Wright, a psychiatry professor at the University of Louisville whose research on computer-assisted cognitive therapy was cited by Brain Resources in a white paper on the scientific basis for the program.

    "Wide spread use of CBT computer programs does have the potential of helping people who do not have psychiatric illness but could benefit from the practical strategies of CBT to enhance problem solving, stress management, etc.," Wright wrote to Fortune in an email. "A caution is that people with real problems such as depression would likely need genuine, well-constructed help programs to relieve symptoms."

    At Nationwide, a case study found that workers who played the games regularly increased their positive thinking by 5%, boosted social skills by 8%, and heightened their emotional resilience by 9%, based on self-reported responses to Brain Resources questions. The company's bottom line improved as well, with an 8% improvement in productivity and 7% decrease in absenteeism, also self-reported.

    Beyond the immediate benefit of improving brain function, the suite of games can work in tandem with other wellness programs to help individuals achieve other health goals, such as weight loss, exercise, or quitting smoking. Employees can set goals within the My Brain Solutions software and track their progress, in addition to working on cognitive areas that will help them stick to the plan.

    "The best outcomes are when people are doing this along with another program," says Kathleen Herath, associate vice president for health and productivity at Nationwide. "If I'm trying to do a weight loss program, learning what motivates my brain and how my brain functions is the key to helping change my behavior."

    The fun, game atmosphere of My Brain Solutions helped Nationwide achieve another goal: making the employee assistance program more appealing and stigma-free. While overall EAP use at Nationwide was at 7.7% in 2007 -- already higher than that year's industry average of 4% -- after introducing My Brain Solutions in 2009, EAP use skyrocketed to 18.4% in 2011.

    My Brain Solutions contributed to greater effectiveness of the broader wellness offerings, Herath says. For instance, Nationwide's percentage of obese and overweight workers has declined between 2010 and 2012.

    "In 2012, for the first time more than 70% of the population is low risk. Our high-risk population is at an all time low of 7%," says Herath. "This is a great mechanism to do by itself. It's a great mechanism to do with counseling. There are applications to it that run across the gamut from our most healthy to our most critical."