Narrator: So, what is it actually like to try to “train” your brain? Let’s take a “Guided Tour” through one of the games from the on-going citizen science project currently being conducted by Dr. Jaeggi and Dr. Seitz.
(Music under)
In this memory game, you are an astronaut exploring a cave on an alien planet. As you walk forward, gems appear on the ceiling and floor of the cave. There’s a Blue gem, a Green gem … Orange … Pink … and Purple.
Your mission is to remember the gems as the appear, and collect the ones that are the same color as the previous one.
Collect the right one and you’ll hear this…
If you Collect the wrong one – you’ll hear this…
OK? Let’s go…
Game player’s thoughts: OK, there’s a green one and there’s a pink one. And the green one, remember, the green … .There’s a blue. OK, we’re going fine and a pink and there’s another pink. Grab it. Yeah, and it’s a purple one. There’s a pink one and purple and purple again. Grab it. Yay!
Narrator: Very good.
The next round is called “2-back” – which means your goal is to collect the gems that are the same color as the one you saw two gems previously. This means that as you watch for the next gem, you must hold in your memory the color of the previous gem AND the one before that.
Ready – let’s go…
Game player’s thoughts: Oh, OK, purple, remember the purple, green, remember the purple, there’s another green, remember the green and there’s another green grab it! Yay! And now purple. Got to remember the green. Green. Grab it. Yeah, purple. Grab it. Yeah, there’s another green one back and another purple and another green. I grab it. Oh darn. There’s another purple. Oh crap. Where am I going with this? And yet another purple to back. Oh got it almost. Oh darn. And there’s a blue. I got to keep going. Purple. You got to remember the blue. There’s a blue. There’s blue to back. Grab it. Oh darn. Another blue Two back. I got it.
Narrator: If you think this is fun, wait until he gets to try 3-back and 4-back!
If you would like to participate in this fun and challenging study, you can sign up with the University of California, Riverside Brain Game Center at www.BrainGameCenter.ucr.edu.
You can find a link in the show notes, or on our website – drphilstieg.com.
Until it’s time for your next workout – so long from “This Is Your Brain – The Guided Tour”