An idea for a simple game that will definitely increase your IQ

[TheQ17]

It's late and I can't sleep so I apologize for any poor grammar.

The concept is simple, 15 words (or whatever # the user chooses) will
flash on the screen in two second(ish) intervals and at the end of the
round you will be asked to remember as many words as you can from the
list.

The benefits of this game would be primarily two pronged dealing with
the two facet's of G, crystallized and fluid :

1. Through practice the amount of words that you remember from each
round will increase. This parallels aspects of an increased fluid IQ
that Dual Nback attempts to produce.

2. The word bank chosen could greatly enhance verbal IQ. If the word
bank is the 4.000+ word bank from the GRE's seeing words you don't
normally use will inevitably expand your vocabulary. Like wise,
looking up words you don't know will have the same effect. This is a
strong advantage over Nbacking due to the applicability in the real
world. With a word bank of sufficient size, you should never run into
the trouble of learning via redundancy. I think it would be best if
the user was able to personalize the word bank as everyone has such
vastly different vocabularies or areas they are familiar with.


What do you guys think?

[Timmy]

I like it, it's hard to justify dual n back without definitive
evidence.Other bonuses like increased vocabulary could really help.

[Reece]

Here is a working example by Posit Science of something similar to
what you describe: http://www.positscience.com/games-teasers/memory-games/word-list-recall
.

I'm not sure how large of a word bank they are pulling words from and
the words are shown too quickly imo. I'd love to see something similar
to what you're describing made and think it would be an excellent
complement to n-backing with Brain Workshop :-)

[Absent_Minded]

I don't see how getting flashed a whole bunch of words on a screen,
and simply remembering what words came up on screen would help in the
real world. You still have to know what the words mean to make them
functional...

If you had to choose only one option, wouldn't it be better to just
dedicate that time to a software like Anki. You can go through your
10000
flash cards all throughout the year WHILE remembering the meaning
too. You can probably go through 100 mature cards per day at ~20 mins
each day. That's well over 30 000 flash cards per year. Even if you
take into account redundancy (multiple flash cards' contents being re-
structured to review the same word), and it'll still be a huge list.

Also, would you get the same effect from replacing the sound stimulus
with actual words being said? That would require some under the hood
changes... maybe when you choose a game mode, you can manually add the
20 or so words you want brainworkshop to say out loud.

[TheQ17]

Obviously it would be more beneficial if you know what most of the
words definitions, that was meant to be implicit. In my situation I
already learned the 4000 GRE words a year ago, but now that I am in a
medically based graduate program I cannot possibly read enough to keep
the words fresh, this would be an easy way to keep the words fresh. I
figured after a period of time I would add maybe 300 words that I am
not totally comfortable with in to the list. Then when those words
popped up I would be compelled to find their definitions if I did not
know them. This is precisely why I stated it would better if the
database was malleable to the user because not everyone will benefit
from the same list.


The comment about real world applicability had much more to do with
the vocabulary learning rather than the increase in working memory
benefits. Although, I do think it would show a smaller, maybe more
subtle benefit.

Another boon that I have been ruminating over but was unable to
properly articulate last night was the chunking aspect. It's human
nature to chunk things that are in lists. Most of the GRE words are
much more abstract than simple objects and often are slightly more
complex emotions. Developing ways to chunk abstract words/thoughts not
only shows mastery but would also enhance creativity.

[Mr. Menesus]

I'd recommend learning the words in the context of a sentence (which uses Broca's/Wernicke's area) rather than the pure definitions (which uses primarily the hippocampus).

An example of using context:
He could not clarify his ______ thoughts
a) innocuous
b) inchoate
c) voracious
d) iconoclast

where the correct answer is (inchoate).

Notice that this differs greatly from asking for the pure definition, e.g.:
What is the definition of inchoate?

--
Probably a mix of methods would provide the greatest benefit; I got this idea from antimoon.com (a website dedicated to learning english for nonnative speakers)

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[polar]

I created "word-n-back" some time ago, but it was more of a semantic
task then a memorizing one. But n-back inspired me to try new ways of
memorizing list of items, or pairs of "foreign word + its
translation": it's quite effective to read (or listen to) the list
continuosly, and repeat in your mind the item(s) presented n-item(s)
back. You have it all there - learning, remembering, interference...
Your idea is nice, but if you don't know the words, you have to have
them explained - this doesn't fit well into continuos process (neither
does "examining" - or rather explaining them at the end of the
session).