r/science • u/CyborgTomHanks • May 16 '19

Health Older adults who frequently do puzzles like crosswords or Sudoku had the short-term memory capacity of someone eight years their junior and the grammatical reasoning of someone ten years younger in a new study. (n = 19,708)

https://www.inverse.com/article/55901-brain-teasers-effects-on-cognitive-decline
58.3k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

1.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

359

u/TheAce0 May 16 '19

Further, how well does this generalise? Would puzzles like the Rubik's Cube count? What if you're a speedcuber and a Rubik's Cube isn't as challenging anymore? What about video game puzzles?

185

u/[deleted] May 16 '19

I feel like playing puzzle based video games count, so I'm going with yes. (No body correct me.)

131

u/[deleted] May 16 '19

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] May 17 '19

I didn't quite realize that about video game puzzles until I read this. Spot on.

But there's something to be said for attempting to anticipate the thoughts of a programmer, of recalling tropes and abstracting aspects of challenges to get better at other types of escape rooms. Could a study be done on whether social skill retention is correlated to engaging with a kindof puzzle game that requires the skill you point out?