Before you dump another moment of your life into searching for brain games that improve your memory, please realize one thing:
Your Brain Exercises Need To Be About Something …
Here's the deal:
A lot of memory games and other brain-enhancing apps try to help improve your memory by giving you abstract or arbitrary memory tasks.
For example, you might be asked to remember the locations of a detective's cap, magnifying glass and a detection kit behind a set of tiles.
The Sherlock Holmes theme is certainly clever, but exactly what kind of memory skills does this exercise train? The answer is easy:
General memory skills.
That's it and nothing more. Or …
… maybe even less.
After all, general brain games help you get good at remembering the location of imaginary objects hidden behind squares on a tiny computer screen. And you have to ask yourself …
Does That Sound Like A Useful Skill To You?
Is there anything wrong with this kind general of brain exercise?
Not necessarily. This Scientific American article finds no harm in playing them (few demonstrable benefits either).
But if you want to get better at remembering the information that matters …
Play Games With Information That Matters!
Seriously. If you want to harness the power of neuroplasticity, give your neurons toys that are congruent with your end goal.
Yes, a basketball player completes some training drills that don't involve a basketball for general fitness.
But when it comes to developing skills and having the REAL fun basketball offers as a game, you need the ball itself in your hands. You need to practice navigating it around the court and sinking it through the hoop.
The Benefits Of Brain Games Do Not Last
First off, have you looked into any of the studies to which many of these software companies refer? Chances are you won't even find any because they often don't exist. This was the finding of one major FTC case that led to a $2 million lawsuit again sellers of a popular brain training program.
Look:
No one is saying that these games don't have some effect.
But exactly how they provide measurable benefits is far from clear. Nor can it be clear. The skills one develops in the games, apart from concentration, rarely, if ever, appear in real life.
This lack of necessity for the "skills" supposedly developed by brain games again brings us to one important fact. To get long lasting effects, we need more than games. We need to link the brain games we play with the information we want to get better at handling.
Which Of These Information Types Do You Tend To Forget Most?
If you want to get good in any of these areas, the best thing is to play brain games that involve these kinds of information. That way, you associate the information with fun while you get better at learning, memorizing and using it in practical situations.
If you're finding you still struggle, please consider understanding the most important difference between memory loss and forgetfulness.
Plus, you'll get long-lasting effects because the more you know about a particular topic, the more you can know.
For example, if you're studying history, k
Published on 9 years, 5 months ago
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