games

UC study finds near-transfer of cognitive training to be necessary (yet not sufficient) for far-transfer, broader benefits

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Guicheng “Ariel” Tan / UCI Work­ing Mem­o­ry & Plas­tic­i­ty Lab

Who ben­e­fits from brain train­ing, and why? (UCI release):

If you are skilled at play­ing puz­zles on your smart­phone or tablet, what does it say about how fast you learn new puz­zles, or more broad­ly, how well can you focus in school or at work? In the lan­guage of psy­chol­o­gists, does “near trans­fer” pre­dict “far transfer”?

A team of psy­chol­o­gists from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, Irvine and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, River­side reports in Nature Human Behav­ior that peo­ple who show near trans­fer are more like­ly to show far trans­fer. For a per­son skilled at play­ing a game, such as Wor­dle, near trans­fer refers to being skilled at sim­i­lar games, such as a cross­word puz­zle. An exam­ple of far trans­fer for this per­son would be the abil­i­ty to bet­ter focus on dai­ly life activ­i­ties. [Read more…] about UC study finds near-trans­fer of cog­ni­tive train­ing to be nec­es­sary (yet not suf­fi­cient) for far-trans­fer, broad­er benefits

Study: For better memory and thinking skills at age 70 (and beyond), play cards and board games from age 11

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Cards, board games could ward off cog­ni­tive decline (UPI):

“Play­ing cards and board games like chess, bin­go and Scrab­ble might be the men­tal work­out you need to keep your wits as you age, Scot­tish researchers suggest.

Peo­ple in their 70s who reg­u­lar­ly play board games score high­er on tests of mem­o­ry and think­ing skills than those who don’t. And 70-some­things who step up their game-play­ing are more like­ly to main­tain think­ing skills as they age [Read more…] about Study: For bet­ter mem­o­ry and think­ing skills at age 70 (and beyond), play cards and board games from age 11

Evidence review: Cognitive training & remediation works, especially in schizophrenia and healthy aging

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Evi­dence That Com­put­er­ized Cog­ni­tive Train­ing Works (Psy­chol­o­gy Today)

“Many peo­ple use com­put­er­ized cog­ni­tive train­ing with the hopes of pre­vent­ing men­tal decline or improv­ing men­tal per­for­mance. But do these brain train­ing games actu­al­ly work?  [Read more…] about Evi­dence review: Cog­ni­tive train­ing & reme­di­a­tion works, espe­cial­ly in schiz­o­phre­nia and healthy aging

Perspective: How brain training games could help patients with Huntington’s disease

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– Lia Koltyrina/Shutterstock

In the search for new treat­ments, sci­ence often focus­es on med­ica­tion first. But drugs aren’t the only way to fight ill­ness, par­tic­u­lar­ly when look­ing at brain dis­eases. My research looks into how play­ing spe­cial­ly designed com­put­er games might help peo­ple who are liv­ing with Huntington’s dis­ease. [Read more…] about Per­spec­tive: How brain train­ing games could help patients with Huntington’s disease

The ultimate in transfer from brain training to real-world outcomes: Reducing the risk of at-fault accidents by almost 50%

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Can you train your brain to dri­ve longer into your gold­en years? (CTV News):

“For the elder­ly, the loss of a driver’s licence could mean the end of inde­pen­dence and the begin­ning of a decline in health, with far-reach­ing con­se­quences in their dai­ly lives…New assis­tive dri­ving tech­nolo­gies seem like an obvi­ous solu­tion in the years to come, but buy­ing new vehi­cles can be too expen­sive; while options like going for adult dri­ving lessons can be too great a blow to some seniors’ pride. Now, sci­en­tists claim that there’s anoth­er option avail­able to help old­er dri­vers main­tain their abil­i­ties on the road. [Read more…] about The ulti­mate in trans­fer from brain train­ing to real-world out­comes: Reduc­ing the risk of at-fault acci­dents by almost 50%

To stimulate your brain, find new ways to challenge yourself every day

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woman brain activity surroundings—–

For Effec­tive Brain Fit­ness, Do More Than Play Sim­ple Games (The New York Times):

“…Legions of baby boomers already use com­put­ers or apps to stim­u­late the brain, but they should be thought of as part of a larg­er engage­ment with the world…Finding new ways to chal­lenge your­self every day, Mr. Rebok said, is a good idea. This can include lots of ordi­nary activ­i­ties like doing men­tal cal­cu­la­tions rather than reach­ing for a cal­cu­la­tor, or tak­ing a new dri­ving route or eat­ing with the oppo­site hand…

Mr. Fer­nan­dez of Sharp­Brains said he would like to see a more sys­tem­at­ic way to mea­sure cog­ni­tion, such as annu­al men­tal health check­ups. “If we had bet­ter assess­ments, we could empow­er con­sumers,” he said. “That’s the next frontier.”

To learn more: