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Why the Rubik’s Cube Prepares You to Resolve Conflicts
Psychology
Solving a Rubik’s cube requires skills such as sustained attention (concentration), reasoning, working memory, planning, and cognitive flexibility.
Do sudokus, crossword puzzles, solve a rubik’s cube or facing chess are games in which many find not only a challenge, but also a distraction. Perhaps your free time is not dedicated to exercising the mind, but the truth is that there are many people who disconnect when facing these enigmas because their objective is to develop, even more if possible, their intelligence.
Borja Esteso, clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist with experience in children, adolescents and adults from mente A mente, a private Mental Health Center, says that the IQ has a part that is inherited from the parents and another that we incorporate from learning or experience, So the ability to stimulate intelligence it depends on the weight of the inherited part and on brain plasticity, that is, “it is greater during childhood and adolescence.”
Rubik’s Cube
The first 2x2x2 cube was designed by Emo Rubik in 1974, and it was a demonstration for his students to understand the complexity of space and movements in three dimensions. «Broadly speaking, it is a visuospatial cognitive task, which requires skills such as sustained attention (concentration), reasoning, working memory, planning and flexible», Says the expert in psychology. People who perform this type of task do so because “it is an enjoyment or entertainment” and, therefore, there is a great weight of motivation.
And you will ask yourself: “did solving a rubik’s cube develop the brain?” Apparently, a cognitive task such as the Rubik’s cubeAlthough it is complex, it is not enough to develop intelligence since it requires a diversity of stimuli, time of practice and regularity: «No one doubts that Mozart was a genius, not only because of his extraordinary ability for music, but also because of the number of hours devoted to his vocation and his perseverance. Other activities such as physical exercise, which has been shown to improve oxygenation and brain function, to learn a new language or playing an instrument, they can stimulate different cognitive abilities ”, explains Borja Esteso, who advises that, rather than aspiring to increase our intellectual quotient, we should enhance the cognitive flexibilitythat is, “cultivating our ability to adapt to adversity and challenging contexts.”
The Rubik’s cube, as the psychologist says, is a visuospatial task, in which the right hemisphere of the brain. “In psychological studies of individual differences, it was shown that men had greater ability to rotate objects in space and spatial orientation, while women had greater command of language.” However, these are group studies, so it does not mean that there are women with good performance in non-verbal tasks and men with good verbal skills.
With what to exercise the mind
As we have already seen, games such as chess, sudoku, tangram, find the differences of several images or the pairs in a card game, puzzles, riddles, dilemmas, mathematical games, Rubik’s cube, etc., if they are done frequently they will help us develop the brain. According to Borja Esteso, there are many board games that can stimulate certain cognitive habilyties, and vice versa, since education professionals have developed learning strategies and models through gamification systems.
Video games, good for your health
Despite the fact that many mothers and fathers are concerned about the use of video games by their children, a recent study by experts from the University of Oxford affirms that time spent playing video games could be good for mental health.
‘Our findings show that video games are not necessarily bad for your health; there are other psychological factors that have a significant effect on people’s well-being, ”says Andrew Przybylski, research director at the institute. «In fact, playing can be an activity that is positively related to people’s mental health, and the regulation of video games could deprive players of those benefits.