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

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. “Some people do very well in training, such as playing a video game, but they don’t show near transfer, perhaps because they are using highly specific strategies,” said first author Anja Pahor, a former research scientist with UCI and UCR who is now working in a similar role with the Department of Psychology at the University of Maribor in Slovenia. “For these people, far transfer is unlikely. By better understanding why this type of memory training or ‘intervention’ works for some people but not others, we can move forward with a new generation of working-memory training games or use approaches that are more tailored to ...
Source: SharpBrains - Category: Neuroscience Authors: Tags: Brain/ Mental Health Education & Lifelong Learning Peak Performance Technology & Innovation brain training Brain-Plasticity brain-training-games cognitive-abilities far transfer Memory-Training near transfer neuroplasticity puzzles Source Type: blogs