Dual N-Back Training for Intelligence | Hacker News Reader

Dual N-Back Training for Intelligence

soakyourhead.com

47 pointsJasber29 comments

If anyone is looking for an open source python version that doesn't require silverlight:

http://brainworkshop.sourceforge.net/

Dual N-back is also available for free online at http://cognitivefun.net (under Tests -> Memory) along with other well-known psychological tasks, including visual/auditory reaction time test, Eriksen flanker test, Stroop test, various flavors of the digit span test, paced serial addition test, and more.

Cognitivefun also has a multimodal n-back, where you can customize most aspects of the test (sounds, images, speed run, double or triple n-back, number of trials):

http://cognitivefun.net/test/24

Hi! I'm the author of soak your head. We worked with the researchers to follow the scientific paper as closely as possible. Feel free to use the app (the source is open and available on the site). In addition, we already have the application in the Windows Phone 7 marketplace, and it's on its way to the iOS app store.

what is your contact info, I would like to contact you.

http://silverbaylabs.org/contact.html

feature request: I would like to be able to use the software with a pointing device or with the two mouse button rather than with the A and L keys.

Wow, I did this, and went through the following stages:

1. What am I supposed to do?

2. Oh okay. Wow, this is really hard.

3. Focus focus focus tunnel vision mode

4. Now I am really good at this.

5. My brain is tired and I am no longer good at this at all.

Here is a pretty nice (and informative) article based on the research behind the Dual N-back game.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=you-can-i...

And a good faq: http://www.gwern.net/N-back%20FAQ

"In the study performed by Susanne M. Jaeggi et. al., study subjects practiced the dual n-back test for about 20 minutes a day for up to 19 days. At the end of that time, the subjects were shown to have increased intelligences (as measured by gF)."

An improvement in intelligence that becomes apparent after only 19 days smells too good to be true. Correct me if I'm wrong, but surely someone that practices IQ test problems will appear to be more intelligent the next time they are evaluated. It seems like something like that might be what they're seeing here, but I don't know enough about this training to say that.

The effects are test-independent. That was sort of the point of the study. You will certainly get better at the dual-n-back game, but the gains apply elsewhere, not just to game itself. It has much to do (they think) with the interconnectedness of fluid intelligence and working memory.

I wrote about this fairly in depth here: http://www.ajkesslerblog.com/how-to-get-smarter/

Interesting, so the idea is that your short-term/working memory is indicative of your fluid intelligence? Then increasing your working memory increases your intelligence.

Seems reasonable enough.

It would definitely make sense (the more you can hold in memory at one time, the faster you could learn stuff), but I don't think they've actually concluded that's how it works. They are clearly related though.

Another hypothesis is that working memory and fluid intelligence both utilize the same neural paths/network, so an increase in one benefits the other.

The study itself is linked in my article above if you're interested in reading it. It's pretty interesting stuff.

Actually it appears that increasing working memory alone doesn't increase intelligence (from the paper). But doing the 2 tasks together does seem to do the trick.

That's the really contentious part of the claim. There's evidence that these games may make you better at performing certain tasks - but there's very little that video games make you generally smarter.

Nicholas Carr has written a nice piece on this http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2011/04/grand_theft_att.ph...

Right. This was the first "game" that actually improved intelligence.

The article you linked doesn't have much to do with the claims about dual-n-back. It seems to be referring exclusively to traditional video games, with most of the claimed benefits relating to hand-eye coordination, spacial recognition, reaction times, stimulus processing, etc. Dual-n-back, and improving working memory, is a totally different animal.

Yes, that's one of the main criticisms - that the n-back task is too similar to the Ravens/BOMAT used to measure _Gf_.

See http://www.gwern.net/N-back%20FAQ#criticism and this paper I haven't incorporated yet which reviews & criticizes a lot of the pro-WM training literature: http://psychology.gatech.edu/renglelab/publications/2010/shi...

Can anyone reccomend a good iPhone or android version?

Android : Brain N-Back

https://market.android.com/details?id=phuc.entertainment.dua... It's well done with good features and free (I am using it since couple of weeks). I think it's a port of this open source project: http://brainworkshop.sourceforge.net/

Cool beans! Thanks for helping out.

I found it incredibly frustrating that for whatever reason the author decided to have A for location and L for audio. Perhaps this is a bug?

It's the same as in other dual n back games

IQ boost for the iPhone is free and soon to be open sourced. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/iq-boost/id286574399?mt=8

Another one here, which I like because it remembers your 'N' and lets you advance only when you're ready.

http://www.brainboffin.com/

Wow , I am also working on a html version of this game. I have got a reasonable version and hope to release it soon

Even if the results are difficult to quantify, anything challenging has fun value.

In the paper didthe difficulty increase automatically? How did that work?

It did increase automatically - the adaptiveness is a major part of the novelty - and it worked basically promoting you when you scored high (like >=80%) and likewise demoting you an N level. If you're curious, Brain Workshop has a Jaeggi mode where it uses the same scoring and promotion criteria.

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