CogniFit - Crossroads: Brain Game

"Crossroads" Brain Game: What is it?

Crossroads is an online brain training game. In order to advance through the levels of this game, the user will have to keep the balls from colliding with one another by putting rocks in the intersections where they might hit. As you progress through the levels, you'll be using more parts of your brain and the cognitive challenge will be even greater.

As you advance and help improve your cognitive skills trained in this online brain game, it will advance with you. Crossroads is a scientific resource designed to constantly measure performance and automatically regulate the difficulty to ensure that the user is getting the most out of each training session. The mind game Crossroads is appropriate for children and adults and can help improve essential cognitive skills.

How can the brain game "Crossroads" improve your cognitive abilities?

Training with brain games like Crossroads stimulates specific neural patterns. The repetition of this pattern through consistent training can help improve the creation of new synapses and neural circuits capable of reorganizing and recovering damaged or weakened cognitive functions.

This brain game can be played by anyone looking to test and improve their cognitive performance.

• Divided Attention: In the brain game Crossroads, the user will have to keep track of all of the balls rolling on the screen to make sure that they don't run into each other, which requires divided attention. As the user advances through the levels, there will be more obstacles and the game will become more difficult, which will require more divided attention. This is a cognitive skill that we use in our daily lives in a number of tasks, like when driving, walking, or working. Training this cognitive skill with Crossroads may make it easier to face other situations where divided attention is required.

• Estimation:The user will have to estimate the distance and speed of each moving ball in order to be able to detect and deter a collision before it happens. Estimation is a cognitive skill that we use in our daily lives, like when you have to slow down at a stoplight. Improving estimation may be able to help improve other daily activities.

• Updating:In this game, the user needs to keep the balls from hitting each other, which means that they need to constantly check to make sure that the balls are not in danger of hitting. Our updating cognitive ability is in charge of this. Updating makes it possible to know if you are meeting your goals or not. This mind game may make doing a number of daily activities easier and more efficient.

• Planning:The user will have to think about when it is truly necessary to place a rock in an intersection as there are only so many rocks available at a time. If the user is able to plan their moves, they may be able to improve this cognitive skill. Planning is also used when driving in order to find the fastest route possible to the office.

• Inhibition:When the user sees that two balls are about to hit, they will have to quickly put a rock at the intersection to keep them from hitting. However, the balls can change their course randomly, which is why the user needs to keep them from hitting. When doing this, the user will be inhibiting the behavior of putting a rock down until it's necessary, in order to be sure that they don't place a rock unnecessarily. Inhibition is one of the cognitive skills that can be activated in this brain game. Better inhibition can help you stop at a stoplight before hitting a car or a pedestrian.

• Short-term Visual Memory:Remembering the position of one ball while paying attention to the others. This will make it easy to later find the same ball after ensuring that the other balls won't run into each other. We use short-term visual memory in order to remember this information. Short-term visual memory is also important at school when remembering what was written on the board as you copy it down in the notebook. Training this cognitive skill may make these types of skills easier and more efficient.

• Focused Attention:The user will use focused attention to detect the balls and the intersections where two balls may hit. Focused attention is a skill that you use daily, like when you pay attention to the teacher during a lecture. You can learn to be more efficient in situations that require focused attention with the brain game Crossroads.

• Spatial Perception:The user has to calculate the spaces, direction, and distance of the balls to see if they are going to hit each other, which requires spatial perception. This is one of the cognitive abilities that is used when driving, to ensure that you don't merge into another lane dangerously. Activating and stimulating spatial perception can help you get around in your day-to-day life.

• Visual Scanning:Finding each ball on the screen is possible because of visual scanning, which will be used when there are two balls close to the same intersection. We use visual scanning when we need to quickly find a stimulus. It's possible to train and improve this skill with Crossroads, which may make it easier to see traffic signs or pedestrians when driving.

• Hand-eye Coordination:Hand-eye coordination is important in Crossroads because it is what makes it possible to drop the rocks in the intersection in time, in order to keep the balls from running into each other. We also use hand-eye coordination in a number of daily tasks, like typing on a computer. Training this cognitive skill can help make movements more precise and effective.

• Response Time:The user will have to place the rocks in the intersection as soon as they see that two balls may hit. This is similar to what may happen while driving on the highway. In both cases, we will have to use our response or reaction time to avoid an accident. Training response time may make you more efficient and careful in your daily life.

• Shifting:If the user sees that there more balls running the risk of hitting each other, they will have to change their strategy. Doing this requires flexibility and cognitive shifting, which can be practiced with Crossroads. Cognitive shifting can also help us in other activities, like changing your route to work when there is an accident.

What happens when you don't train your cognitive abilities?

Our brains are designed to save resources and be as efficient as possible, which is why it erases the connections that aren't being used. This is why if a certain cognitive skill isn't used frequently, the brain doesn't supply it with the resources it needs, and it becomes weaker and weaker. This makes us less able to use the weakened cognitive skill, making us less efficient in activities in our daily lives.