
Does playing chess make you smarter? A look at the evidence - imaliesiera
https://theconversation.com/does-playing-chess-make-you-smarter-a-look-at-the-evidence-76062
======
lefstathiou
I think playing Chess as kid did wonders for me in life and as an adult.

Speaking only for myself, I am a competitive person and generally play to win
any board game (as opposed to say golf which I suck at and play for pure
leisure)

A couple notable things Chess did for me:

1) taught me to think about multi-layered cause and effect (something I use
daily in my life as a manager) - ie how to create and execute a strategy

2) boosted my Confidence in making a decision and owning the outcome
(something I believe a lot of people struggle with).

3) Taught me to be aware of my state of mind. I lost countless games I “should
not have” for endless reasons I felt were preventable. Today I am hyper aware
of my state of mind and will deploy fixes to get me to a better state
depending on the issue (need more rest, stop the distractions, white board it
out)

4) inspired me. Nothing like playing against a great player and seeing the
beauty of a strategy unfold all the while your pieces and strategy slowly
disintegrate into a blazing flame of glory. I saw the possibilities of what I
could accomplish with study and practice

5) I could add a lot to this list...

Now did any of the above improve my GPA or SAT scores? Not directly but I do
think it’s undoubtedly helped my career. No question in my mind that I am
teaching my son chess just like my father did for me.

~~~
econcon
Chess came from India where it was used by the ruling class to learn important
skill like emotional management.

As the rulers had all power, it was incredibly very easy for them to get mad
at someone and engage in destructive activities. Chess helped the new princes
learn emotional management and act better when met with situation like,
strategy failing, loss of your resources etc...

Later the game was brought to middle East by Arab traders from where it went
to Europe and new world.

~~~
jagannathtech
New princes in India went to ashrams to learn all these things or have
dedicated gurus.

------
pattusk
GM Hikaru Nakamura famously took the Mensa online IQ test and scored a very
average 102

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx3h70GoaoM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx3h70GoaoM)

I guess if you accept IQ as a proxy for general cognitive ability, this would
suggest the article is right. On the other hand, I still find it very counter
intuitive. The ability to plan ahead and the spatial thinking are things I
though would transfer well to other domains (arguably both are not things that
an IQ test, or the academic tests from the article, would measure well
though).

~~~
gameswithgo
It isn't assumed that IQ is a proxy go general cognitive ability, it is known
that it correlates to some degree with many positive outcomes and abilities.

So you can look up how well it correlates with what things, and what it
doesn't, and get an idea of what it is predictive of.

It isn't anywhere near perfect of course, you can't capture the whole of a
person's cognitive ability in one number, but then it is only a "proxy" as you
said.

~~~
weego
Recent research across various specialisations just indicates that being good
at mensa tests largely only correlates to being good at mensa tests.

~~~
david-gpu
Sources, please. Peer-reviewed, if possible.

Mensa is an association of moderately high-IQ people, and IQ correlates
positively [0] with education and income, among other things.

[0]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_correlations)

~~~
remote_phone
Anyone considered “profoundly gifted”, ie IQ over 145, would shudder at the
idea of being associated with Mensa. It’s basically an organization for
moderately intelligent people with self-esteem issues who like to think they
are rare geniuses.

~~~
c3534l
That sounds like the exact same personality issue, but with the added flaw
that they're too smart even for those Mensa plebs.

~~~
remote_phone
Most profoundly gifted people don’t want to be “outed” as profoundly gifted
because they have been bullied or ostracized for much of their lives because
of it. There’s a reason why very high IQ scores don’t correlate to very high
success. High IQ is nothing except a certificate you can hang on your wall to
brag, hard work is what gets you success.

------
jfkebwjsbx
Chess is all about memorizing patterns of many kinds to then recognize them
and reapply on the spot.

What all great chess players have in common is an amazing memory and the will
to think and work on chess all day long (which is more astonishing to me than
the memory side).

~~~
qxf2
This line of thinking ends up being applied only to chess, while what you are
saying is true about most fields that need human expertise and judgement.

LeBron James is famous for being able to remember every shot he makes. There
are cricketers who can tell you ball-by-ball plays from memory. Roger Federer
remembers most of his matches. I have seen technical founders have an uncanny
ability to 'remember' their code bases and figure out what to change. Boxers
remember fights and sparring sessions in crazy detail. Mathematicians can do
the same with papers they read ages ago.

I feel that memory and understanding co-evolve. The more you understand
something, the better you remember it. The more knowledge you are able to
memorize, the better you are able to understand and assimilate and create new
ideas.

I am commenting because I have seen several smart people give this line about
chess being about memory without realizing their professional expertise
involves a great deal of memory too. In my experience, this is probably
because when kids play chess, there is always this one kid trying to memorize
opening and dazzle other people. Ultimately, those kids do not go on to become
grandmasters. But yet, the people who lose to them think they lost because
they did not memorize an opening.

~~~
saberience
"LeBron James is famous for being able to remember every shot he makes"

No he isn't, and no he can't. This is total hyperbole and he has never said he
can remember "every shot" he has made. He can identify games from short
sections of video, and he can remember certain memorable dunks, etc. But he
can't (and no one else can either) remember every shot (including failed
shots).

~~~
qxf2
You are right. Upon, rereading - yes, this is hyperbole. I didn't intend that.

My point should have been that he can remember plays when triggered just like
a high level chess player can remember positions when triggered. The expert's
memory is way better than what ordinary people remember in almost any domain
that requires human expertise and judgement.

------
dwheeler
Far more important than whether or not chess makes you smarter is... that
teaching chess helps kids appreciate thinking ahead. This doesn't make them
smarter per se, but it helps them realize that they should be using their
smarts. Learning to think ahead about what will likely happen is an incredibly
important life skill.

------
TulliusCicero
> The same applies to video game training

Eh? I read the introduction/summary of the linked article, it appears to say
not that there's a failure to transfer, but that it depends on the game:

> Enhancing perceptual and attentional skills requires common demands between
> the action video games and transfer tasks Adam C. Oei and Michael D.
> Patterson* Division of Psychology, School of Humanities and Social Sciences,
> Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore Despite increasing
> evidence that shows action video game play improves perceptual and cognitive
> skills, the mechanisms of transfer are not well-understood. In line with
> previous work, we suggest that transfer is dependent upon common demands
> between the game and transfer task. In the current study, participants
> played one of four action games with varying speed, visual, and attentional
> demands for 20 h. We examined whether training enhanced performance for
> attentional blink, selective attention, attending to multiple items, visual
> search and auditory detection. Non-gamers who played the game (Modern
> Combat) with the highest demands showed transfer to tasks of attentional
> blink and attending to multiple items. The game (MGS Touch) with fewer
> attentional demands also decreased attentional blink, but to a lesser
> degree. Other games failed to show transfer, despite having many action game
> characteristics but at a reduced intensity. The results support the common
> demands hypothesis.

Given that this linkage appears to be misleading, it's hard to take the
conclusions of the article seriously; what else are they misleading the reader
about?

~~~
boomboomsubban
The research is still showing that training with video games is only improving
the video game skill, the "common demands." It is not transferring to improved
overall cognition. That is in line with what the article says.

~~~
TulliusCicero
No, it says that it improves whatever skill is shared in common between the
game and other task:

> In line with previous work, we suggest that transfer is dependent upon
> common demands between the game and transfer task.

Which is, I mean, duh? Was someone else suggesting that playing a game would
improve a completely random skill? Obviously there'd had to be something in
common.

Maybe I'm misreading this though.

~~~
boomboomsubban
Your quote is the "common demands" I mentioned. Video games will improve your
ability to do tasks very similar to what happens in the video game. The actual
research done isn't relevant to the article, they just used it as one of many
papers supporting the "common demands" theory.

The article is talking about how those things won't improve your general
intelligence, as many people did think playing chess would randomly make you
smarter.

~~~
TulliusCicero
I suppose this depends on how narrow the tasks/skills in question are, as
there are various ways to measure general intelligence.

For example, there was a study indicating that playing Starcraft improved
multi-tasking ability:

> Using a meta-analytic Bayes factor approach, we found that the gaming
> condition that emphasized maintenance and rapid switching between multiple
> information and action sources led to a large increase in cognitive
> flexibility as measured by a wide array of non-video gaming tasks.

I suppose here the rub would be, exactly how specific or different from the
video game were these "non-video gaming tasks"? If they're broad enough that
we consider them reasonable measurements of overall multi-tasking ability,
then yes, playing Starcraft maybe made you smarter in one particular
dimension. If they're all very similar to the game itself, and broader
measurements found no change, then no.

> To determine changes in cognitive flexibility that occurred as a result of
> video gaming, participants completed a battery of psychological tasks at
> pre-test and post-test (at 40 hours of gaming). The battery included
> measures that address cognitive flexibility as well as measures of unrelated
> constructs. Measures of flexibility included the Attention Network Test
> (ANT) [28], Stroop task [29], task switching [30], a novel multi-location
> memory task, and test of Operating Span (Ospan; distinct from simple
> counting memory span) [31], [32]. These are classic measures of cognitive
> flexibility in that they require the switching or coordination of cognitive
> processes in order to successfully navigate the task at hand. For example,
> the task switching paradigm involves switching between two different
> stimulus identification tasks. All the measures in the cognitive flexibility
> task group assess the ability to coordinate attentional processes between
> two or more concurrent or alternating operations. Measures of predicted
> unrelated constructs included the balloon analogue risk task (BART) [33],
> visual search task [14], information filtering task [34], and WAIS-IV digit
> span memory task [35], [36]. These tasks were chosen to help delineate the
> specific hypothesis that RTS training would lead specifically to cognitive
> flexibility enhancements given that RTS game play stresses fast-paced
> switching and coordination of decisional processing. The visual search task
> and the information filtering task were chosen due to their use in previous
> action video game research [12], in order to differentiate RTS training from
> action video game training. BART and the digit span memory task were chosen
> due to further delineate cognitive flexibility from the broad domains of
> risk sensitivity and general memory. Participant groups were equated on the
> Multimedia Multitasking Index (MMI), a measure of the amount of time an
> individual spends simultaneously engaged in more than one form of media
> [37]. Consistent with best scientific practices and openness, the task
> grouping and analysis strategy were determined and publically disclosed [38]
> prior to data collection.

Gonna be honest here, that all sounds rather impressive to me but I have no
idea what those tests actually entail.

[https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0070350)

~~~
boomboomsubban
They mention somewhere that the tests were chosen to be as similar as possible
to the chosen video games actions.

You're missing the point of the research paper. From the beginning, they
supported the common demands theory being discussed. They were trying to
determine what aspect of a game led to the transfer of the skills to the
common demand task, and found that demanding games that required you to use
that skill the most led to the best transfer of those skills to the common
task.

Meanwhile, the article is using the common demands theory to support their
claim,

>The fact that skills learned by training do not transfer across different
domains seems to be a universal in human cognition. In other words, you get
better, at best, at what you train in – which may just sound just like good
old fashioned common sense.

Improving your ability to attend to multiple items may have some benefit
outside of video games, but it's not going to help your grades much. You'd be
far better off spending that time studying.

 _edit_ sorry, I did not notice that was a different study. My broad point
doesn't change though, using StarCraft to train your multitasking is just
going to benefit your multitasking.

~~~
TulliusCicero
I feel like we're arguing different things. The full paragraph that I
originally quoted from says:

> The failure of generalisation of a particular skill, in fact, happens to
> occur in many other areas beyond chess – such as music training, which has
> been shown to have no effect on non-music cognitive or academic abilities.
> The same applies to video game training, brain training, and working memory
> training, among others.

But then, the article they linked to doesn't support that, and you yourself
agree that you can train a particular skill through games that will apply to
other, non-gaming tasks that use the same skill. Yes, it won't affect other
cognitive skills (duh), but it does generalize to other domains that use the
same skill.

~~~
boomboomsubban
You're taking "non-music cognitive or academic abilities" to mean "abilities
that will only benefit playing music" when they mean "abilities used playing
music that may have some use elsewhere." Keeping time for example. The link
fully supports that statement then.

The rest of the article makes it clear they realize these skills can be
helpful in other areas, they mention chess helps with geometry and math at the
end. And you seem to agree with the article as you think it's obvious that
they won't affect other cognitive skills.

~~~
TulliusCicero
> You're taking "non-music cognitive or academic abilities" to mean "abilities
> that will only benefit playing music" when they mean "abilities used playing
> music that may have some use elsewhere."

Lol. "Music-related skills have no benefit for skills that don't benefit from
music skills". Very convenient to make your supported outcome a tautology.

~~~
boomboomsubban
I'm not randomly choosing it, that definition is used throughout the article
and the links provided.

Providing a minor improvement to common tasks is nothing like the boost to
overall general intelligence and academic ability that people say activities
like music or chess cause. Aggressive parents don't force their kids to play
an instrument to improve their sense of time.

------
paulpauper
Of course it cannot make you smarter. Intelligence is innate. chess is a
skill/ability in which ones proficiency may be positively correlated with IQ
but in and of itself does not make you smarter. There are no exercises or
activities that have been shown to actually rise IQ, unfortunately.

~~~
HALtheWise
(note that of the many possible definitions of intelligence, I'm using IQ here
to align with research terminology)

There are definitely activities that have been shown to increase IQ, even when
attempting to correct for confounders, although not by a dramatic amount.

For example, spending an additional year in school increases IQ by 1-5 points,
depending on which study you believe. [0] Similarly, having a healthy diet as
a child "increases" IQ, although you could equivalently phrase it as
malnutrition decreasing IQ.

[0]
[https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brainstorm/201806/ho...](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brainstorm/201806/how-
much-does-education-really-boost-intelligence)

~~~
chongli
From the article:

 _The three study types respectively yielded estimated IQ increases of
approximately one point, two points, and five points per additional year of
schooling._

And what were the three study types?

 _Cognitive tests were taken before participants differed in their degree of
education (e.g., before some dropped out of high school) and again afterward,
sometimes decades later.

A policy change, such as an increase in the mandatory education level,
resulted in some students staying in school for longer.

Students who made an age cutoff to begin schooling were compared with students
who had not._

So the best study, which tested IQ scores before and after, showed the least
improvement, at 1 IQ point. Not exactly a ringing endorsement of education for
boosting IQ. I would conclude the opposite of this article. When better
studies show smaller and smaller effect sizes that’s a good indicator that
there’s probably nothing going on.

------
Gatsky
One question is whether you can learn non-cognitive skills from chess that
transfer to other fields eg. tenacity, dealing with loss, the ability to sit
and think for long periods of time. I probably had some of the most memorable
failures of my sheltered life on the chess board, starting from when I got
suckered with a 4 move checkmate in the first week I learned how to play.

~~~
new2628
Some of these skills (I would add: patience, focus, controlling anger,
planning a few steps ahead) definitely transfer and are especially valuable to
teach to children. But all these apply at the beginning already, for champion-
level play the famous Morphy quote applies:

"The ability to play chess is the sign of a gentleman. The ability to play
chess well is the sign of a wasted life."

------
saucymew
Chess was my FIRST introduction to "money hustle" via tournaments, playing
pick-up park games, against my dad, etc.

Owning the results and preparing for the next game taught me a life outlook:
Win or lose, there's always a new game waiting if you still want to play.

------
WarOnPrivacy
Reading thru the posts here, I realize that what we ought to be searching for
isn't what makes us smarter but what makes us more able.

------
abhayhegde
I have been playing chess since 10. Whether smarter or not, it has made me
cautious and planning way ahead for many of my endeavors. Thinking through
each move, weighing every chance and pouncing on the slightest opportunity to
win it all has certainly made me feel a lot more confident in myself.

It is an addiction.

------
putzdown
“The chess community is probably right in criticising the recent study, as it
suffers from several methodological shortcomings that probably invalidate the
results.” A remarkably self-undermining statement, and at odds with the tone
of finality in the rest of the article.

------
cy6erlion
Playing chess does not make you smarter but studying chess does. You see when
you decide to study chess theoretically you come to a point where you want to
figure out a system to increase your chances of winning. Chess is very dynamic
and complex, uncountable positions can be reached so the system you come up
with should consider all of those factors. Chess theorist (not necessarily GM
players who mostly memorize patterns) are able/trying to grasp complexity in a
systematic way. The skills learned from studying chess can be applied to
studying the stock market, distributed systems and other inherently complex
systems.

------
ryanthedev
I mean. The same could be said about MTG, DND and a lot of other games.

Seems obvious to me if you play a game that makes you use your brain, it will
help you in the long run.

If you just use your brain to consume trash it will become trash.

Garbage in, garbage out.

------
bluedino
Are any of the well-known grandmasters computer programmers?

~~~
agarv
Mikhail Botvinnik
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Botvinnik](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Botvinnik)

------
asimpletune
I think part of the reason why we don’t see chess having a predictive impact
is because the ability to generalize a specific skill must also be acquired
for that to happen. Basically, being able to extrapolate a narrow skill to
more general problems, is in its own right a skill.

------
sam_lowry_
Looking at Kasparov, not really.

Bet seriously, I have seen famous programmers in person. And famous sportsmen.
A disproportionate number of them are dull IRL.

So, do play chess. Just do not build your life around. And do let your parents
lock you up to reach world-best results.

------
pbhjpbhj
Slightly OT:

>This is why so many parents around the world are keen to get their children
playing chess //

Did they study this or is it assumed. I taught my kids to play because it's
fun and I hoped they'd enjoy playing.

------
mrfusion
I’ve been doing well just kind of obliterating all the pawns early on. It
seems to open up the board a lot and presents opportunities.

Is there a name for that strategy or maybe it will backfire against better
players.

~~~
metroholografix
The worse you are the chess, the more you want to keep pawns on the board
since they tactically restrict the game. The more pawns that go off, the more
the game opens up into sharp tactical lines which give experienced players an
enormous advantage.

All of that leads into my recommendation for getting good at Chess as a
beginner: Don't waste any time with opening preparation. Pick two openings you
like (one for white, one for black) and stick with them. All your time and
effort should go into tactics.

~~~
newen
This is just false. Tons and tons of closed positions played by grandmasters.

~~~
metroholografix
Grandmasters spend enormous amounts of time doing opening preparation, in some
cases creating strategies for and memorizing entire opening lines.

Is that going to help bad/beginner/average players? Not at all, in many ways
they're not even playing the same game. Jumping to conclusions based on what
Grandmasters do is therefore apt to mislead.

~~~
newen
Granted, but saying worse players prefer closed positions is just false. Take
the French defense, for example. Advance variation of the French is much
harder for beginners compared to the exchange variation. And you can say the
same for many other positions.

------
massysett
Yes of course it does. So does listening to classical music and having
leather-bound Shakespeare volumes in a home library.

------
mellosouls
Does playing chess make you smarter? Not _really_ \- presumably the title has
been miscopied?

~~~
imaliesiera
Corrected. Thanks.

~~~
mellosouls
cheers - I've since posted the original article link in another comment.

------
nefitty
Apparently, the authors believe chess skill is domain specific. This is
opposed to domain generalization, ie claims such as “chess makes you smarter”.

Compared to a list of actual domain generalizable skills, it is clear that
chess would be the odd one out. For example, some domain generalizable skills
include self-control, leadership, time management, etc.

------
sabujp
what about playing go?

------
murgindrag
I'll take issue with this quote: "This is a problem because research has shown
that the excitement and fun induced by novel activities can cause a positive
temporal effect on test scores - a placebo effect."

This is not a placebo effect. Doing a variety of things does make you smarter.
If I learn to play chess, there is a very real effect. From there, you have
diminishing returns on investment. If I play chess for 4 hours per day, then
it crowds out other, more productive activities.

There is a perceived mystique to chess, but it's no different then checkers,
contemporary German game geek games, or any of a range of other strategic
games. People who play such games a lot will be better players when placed in
a novel game (or a real-life situation which requires the same type of
strategic thinking).

And such games are no different than a broader set of other cognitively-
engaging activities, be that logic puzzles, editing Youtube videos, or
STEM/maker activities.

In most activities, there's an initial surge of growth (so long as I do it for
long enough to learn something -- not a one-hour thing I forget after a few
months), followed by rapidly diminishing returns, but that's far from
universal. In programming, for example, that surge comes when people start to
think algorithmically (e.g. in terms of big-O notation), not when learning to
order operations. In reading/writing, that comes when people start to really
think through audiences, structure of text, etc.

~~~
thinkingemote
The placebo effect is a real thing as in its a good positive thing that is
fundamentally real. You do feel better even if the effect is a placebo.

Placebo doesn't mean fake, or the subject imagined it up, or pretended.

In science you have to control for things to make sure effects can not be just
a temporary effect.

~~~
sitkack
> In science you have to control for things to make sure effects can not be
> just a temporary effect.

The duration doesn't have anything to do with whether something is scientific.
It has to do with a statistical correlation of cause and effect.

------
mellosouls
The original article (from 2017) - this one has been lifted without the links
which provide references.

[https://theconversation.com/does-playing-chess-make-you-
smar...](https://theconversation.com/does-playing-chess-make-you-smarter-a-
look-at-the-evidence-76062)

------
lmilcin
I think this is one thing that would be very, very difficult to study right.

There is huge selection bias. Playing chess for a long time select people who
are very different from general public and from people who just decided to
play but will drop it soon. People also play chess in a different way: some
people play just to kill time while some play really competitively.

I think that regardless of whether chess in itself doesn't do much (I would be
surprised if that was so), people who can stick to playing chess competitively
are more likely to also exercise their minds in other ways.

I also believe that playing chess is one of those exercises that have other
beneficial results (like training focus). Other example might be running which
I think of the beneficial effects one that people forget to mention is
training ones willpower (assuming you do more than just light jog).

