Intellect chess. Chess is the greatest brain game and trainer
Research by Michigan Scientists state university showed that intelligence, and not just tireless practice, largely determines the skill of playing chess. Thus, the researchers obtained strong evidence for the link between cognitive ability and skills, and seem to have solved one of the most discussed problems in psychology, refuting the theory that experience is based solely on intensive learning.
"Chess is probably the most studied area of research in knowledge and experience, but the evidence for the relationship between chess skills and cognitive ability is mixed," says lead author of the University of Michigan study Alexander Burgoyne. that cognitive ability largely determines individual differences in chess playing skills. "
"When it comes to experience, learning and practice is definitely part of the puzzle," says University of Michigan professor of psychology Hambrick. "However, this study shows that, for chess, at least, intelligence is another piece of the puzzle."
For an in-depth study known as meta-analysis, the researchers reviewed 2,300 scientific articles on chess skills specifically designed for research that included assessments of cognitive ability (such as an IQ score) and objective chess skills (such as an ELO rating). evaluating players based on game performance). The final sample included 19 studies, involving about 1800 people.
"Meta-analysis represents the first effort by researchers to systematically examine the best available data on the relationship between intelligence and chess skill," says Burgoyne, a graduate student in the Cognitive Neuroscience Program at the University of Michigan.
Research has shown that intelligence is associated with chess skill in the general sample, but especially among young chess players and people with low skill levels. At the same time, top-level players have different levels of intelligence, but almost all of them are quite smart people.
Hembrik explains: “Imagine, a genius can become a skilled chess player relatively easily, while a person of average intelligence may take more time to do so. game, you can bypass the limitations of cognitive ability. " This may be true for chess, he adds, but not for all activities.
On May 11, 1997, at the Equitable Center in the suburbs of Manhattan, Garry Kasparov, who had been the world chess champion since 1985, resigned after only 19 moves in last game a 6-game match in which he played against Deep blue , chess computer developed by IBM engineers.
This was Kasparov's second defeat in the match: he won one game; the other three ended in a draw - which meant that he lost the entire match and, more importantly, lost his unofficial title of "the best chess brain on the planet," according to the reporter New York Times who was present at this event.
V chess world and outside it, there was a huge debate about what Kasparov's defeat meant. (A few days before the match, the magazine Newsweek published a long article, on the cover was the title that the magazine gave to this match - "The last stronghold of the human brain."
At a grim post-match conference, Kasparov said he was ashamed of his loss and puzzled by his extraordinary ability Deep blue... “I'm only human,” he sighed. "When I see something in front of me that far surpasses my understanding, I become afraid."
For many people, a triumph Deep blue symbolized not only a challenge to human skill in chess, but also an existential threat to the unique intelligence of our biological species. It's as if the dolphin school had composed a great symphony.
Indeed, the ability to play chess has long been considered a symbol of the flexibility of the brain: the more intelligent you are, the better you play chess, and vice versa. In his 1997 book Chess Genius, British grandmaster Jonathan Levitt deduced the exact mathematical relationship between IQ and chess talent, calling it Levitt's equality:
Elo ~ (10 x IQ) + 1000
Combination Еlo stands for a player's tournament rating - and in his equality, Levitt explained, he was referring to the highest rating a player could achieve "after years of participating in tournaments and studying chess." (Funny squiggle after the word Elo means roughly equal.) So if you have an average IQ of 100, Levitt calculates that the highest rating you can ever hope for is 2000. An IQ of 120 could potentially give you 2200 points. Etc.
But not everyone accepts the premise that chess talents are closely and directly related to pure IQ. Jonathan Rawson, a young Scottish grandmaster who has written several provocative books about chess, calls Levitt's equality "completely wrong."
Rawson says that the most important talents in chess have nothing to do with intelligence at all; these are talents psychological and emotional .
“Most of the leading academic chess treatises overlook what is essential to a chess player’s thinking and feeling,” wrote Rawson in his book The Seven Deadly Sins of Chess ( The seven Deadly chess sins). "Their fault is that they perceive chess as almost exclusively a cognitive activity, where the choice of moves and understanding of positions is based only on the basis of mental patterns and inferences."
The two most important executive functions are cognitive flexibility and cognitive self-control. Both of these skills are central to the training that Spiegel gives his students.
In reality, he wrote, if you want to become a great chess player, or even just a good one, "your ability to recognize your emotions and apply them to the last drop is just as important as the way you think."
During chess lessons in IS 318 and in the after-game instructions for students during tournaments, Elisabeth Spiegel often passes on specific chess knowledge to her pupils: how to notice the difference between Slavic and semi-Slavic defense; how to determine the relative value of an elephant moving on white squares and an elephant moving on black squares.
But most of the time (and it amazed me while I was watching her work) what she did was much easier - and at the same time much more difficult: she taught her students a new way of thinking... Its methodology is closely related to the metacognitive strategies that Martin Seligman studied and taught by Angela Duckworth. And to me, her system seemed inextricably linked with the research that neuroscientists are conducting in the field of executive functions - those mental abilities of a higher order that are compared to the control center of air traffic controllers in the brain.
The two most important executive functions are cognitive flexibility and cognitive self-control. Cognitive flexibility Is the ability to see alternative solutions to problems, to think "outside the box", to negotiate in unfamiliar situations. Cognitive self-control Is the ability to suppress an instinctive or habitual response and replace it with a more effective but less obvious response.
Both of these skills are central to the training that Spiegel gives his students. Winning chess, she says, requires a highly developed ability to see new and different ideas. “What is a particularly creative winning move you overlooked? What potentially disastrous move of your adversary are you blindly ignoring? "
She also teaches her charges to resist the temptation to make a compelling, attractive move, since this type of move (as Sebastian Garcia found out) often leads to further problems.
“Teaching chess means teaching those habits that are associated with thinking,” Spiegel explained to me when I attended her classes. - For example, how to understand your mistakes and how to become better aware of your thought processes.
Before becoming a chess teacher in IS 318 Spiegel taught English to the eighth grade, and as such, she says, it was a complete disaster. She taught the basics of composition in the same way she analyzed chess game Sebastian: when students handed her written papers, she went through each job, proposal by proposal, with each student, asking questions: “Well, are you sure that this the best way say what you want to say ”?
“They looked at me as if I was insane,” she told me. - I wrote them long letters about what they wrote. It took me a whole evening to sort through six or seven papers.
Although Spiegel's teaching style was not very suitable for the class English language but her experience teaching English helped her better understand what she wanted to do in chess class.
Rather than follow the chess curriculum planned for the entire year ahead, she decided that she would create her academic calendar on the go, planning lessons based solely on what her students already knew and, more importantly, that they didn’t. knew.
For example, she somehow took her students to a chess tournament - and noticed that many of them "hang" pieces (which means that they left their pieces unprotected, making them easy targets). The following Monday, she devoted a lesson on how not to "hang" the pieces by reconstructing the lost games on the green boards hanging from the hooks in front of the class. Over and over again, she reviewed the games of her students, both individually and as a whole class, thoroughly analyzing where the player went wrong, where he could go differently, what might have happened if he made the best move, and replaying all these possible scenarios several moves ahead before returning to the moment of error.
While this might seem like a very sensible approach to the outside world, in reality it is a completely unusual way of teaching or learning chess.
“Focusing carefully on what you’re not doing is uncomfortable,” Spiegel told me. “So usually people learn to play chess by reading books about it. These books can be funny, often intellectually entertaining, but reading does not turn into a skill. If you want to truly achieve something in chess, you need to analyze your games and find out what and where you did wrong.
Ideally, this is a bit like what people get from psychotherapy, Spiegel says. You take apart mistakes you have made - or mistakes you keep repeating - and try to get to the bottom of the reasons why you make them. And just like the best psychotherapists, Spiegel tries to lead his students along a narrow and difficult path: make them take responsibility for their mistakes and learn from them, without dwelling on these mistakes and not indulging in self-flagellation .
Chess is truly a brilliant game in which you need logic, the ability to build a strategy, and predict the next moves of your opponent. This game is a great way to develop intellectual abilities regardless of age. The game unfolds on a board lined with 64 squares of black and white colors. Each opponent has 16 pieces at their disposal: 8 pawns, 2 rooks, 2 knights, 2 bishops, a queen and a king.
The object of the game is to checkmate the opponent's king, that is. attack the king so that he has nowhere to run. A very useful activity that will help you improve your memory, logic, ability to build a strategy, the ability to predict the opponent's moves, miscalculation several moves ahead. The game ends if the king cannot move and is attacked by an enemy piece. We recommend Chess for you and your child.
Memorizing chess moves
First, let's start with what chess is. Chess is an ancient, truly, brilliant game in which you need logic, the ability to build a strategy, and predict the next moves of your opponent. Yes, you need to play this game with someone. The game unfolds on a board lined with 64 squares of black and white colors. Each opponent has 16 pieces at their disposal, each moving according to the rules of chess.
The goal of the game is not to leave moves to the opponent, to checkmate the king. A very useful activity that will help you improve your memory, logic, ability to build a strategy, the ability to predict the opponent's moves, miscalculation several moves ahead. The game ends if the king cannot move and is attacked by an enemy piece. This is a great brain development game.
If you do not know how to play chess, then consider how all the pieces move on the chessboard.
Where is the chess battle taking place?
So let's start with the chess battlefield - the chessboard. The chessboard is a field divided into 64 cells, that is, 8x8 cells, with alternating colors: black and white.
On two opposite sides, the cells are designated by letters (eng. From A to H). On the other two opposite sides - in numbers (from 1 to 8).
Chess pieces are placed along the side indicated by the letters. White chess is located on the lines under the numbers 1 and 2. And the black chess is under the numbers 7 and 8.
How do chess pieces move?
Each player has 16 chess pieces at his disposal. The 16 chess includes: 8 pawns, 2 rooks, 2 knights, 2 bishops, a queen and a king.
On the white side, the pawns are placed on line 2 on all letters. Rooks at the ends of the first line, knights next to rooks, bishops next to knights, queen under D and king under E.
The pieces on the black side are mirrored. That is, pawns on line 7, and the rest of the pieces on line 8 opposite white pieces.
Pawns have the right to walk only forward, that is. along the line named by the letter. If the pawn is on the 2nd or 7th rank, then the first move has the right to move to the first or second square forward.
A pawn can cut off another piece only on the first square, diagonally to the left and to the right.
Rooks can walk in a straight line, that is, either horizontally or vertically.
Horse walks with the letter G, in any direction, namely:
Elephant, some may call him an "officer", walk only diagonally in any direction.
Queen combines the capabilities of a bishop and a rook. That is, it can walk diagonally, vertically, horizontally on either side.
King- the main figure in the game, which is customary to defend. It is impossible to cut down the king, and if the king is under attack, then he must be taken to a safe place. And the king can move in any direction, but one cell.
Influence of chess on brain function, thinking, memory, attention
There are many ways to start a game. That is, methods of effective attack on the opponent have been invented, however, options for defenses have been invented against such attacks. Such combinations are called "gambit", which means a bandwagon. Usually gambits are named after the chess player who invented it.
It is in this direction that your memory develops, namely, it is needed to memorize as much as possible more gambits and defenses at the beginning of the game and in the sequel.
The most famous beginning chess game – "Spanish Defense"... The Spanish defense was named after the Spaniard Rui Lopez, who invented it. But this debut was described long before Rui was born.
Starts with moves:
2) Kg1-f3 Kb8-c6
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Conclusion
The game of chess is interesting and developing board game... Chess is something that will help develop your brain and your memory.
The game of chess is billions of different game combinations and game outcomes. There are also many options for starting to get an advantageous position or exchange against an opponent. In order to prevent a favorable position of the enemy, you will have to study many gambits and remember them all.
Can you reconstruct the game without recording the moves? Good memory is required. You can practice as follows: play a game with a person, and then try to restore it from memory.
Learn, play, solve problems, learn new things, learn defenses and gambits and chess will obey you. But not only that nice bonus... Developed memory is the main bonus!
It's not just that chess is known as the "game of kings". There is no doubt that the rulers of empires and kingdoms saw this game as a great opportunity to practice strategic thinking and predicting the behavior of the enemy on the real battlefield, in confrontation with other monarchs or invaders. As people learn more about the brain, many begin to insist that chess be widely used in education. What is such an incredible effect of this game on the brain? How does it improve his performance?
May Boost Your IQ Level
Chess has always had a problem with its image - it was perceived as a game for geniuses and people with already high level IQ. Long time there has been debate about whether smart people start playing chess or whether playing chess makes people smart. At least one study has clearly shown that this game can increase the level of human intelligence. A study conducted among four thousand teenagers showed a significant increase in IQ in those children of both sexes who learned to play chess for four months.
Helps Prevent Alzheimer's Disease
Since your brain works like a muscle, it, like any muscle, requires stress to avoid injury and exhaustion. In a recent study, 75 people who took part in it were constantly engaged in brain activity, including playing chess. And this led to a significant decrease in the likelihood of developing dementia. Actually, just as muscles that do not receive physical activity lose strength, so non-use of the brain leads to a loss of its power. This is another reason why you should start playing chess.
Loads both halves of the brain
In a study in Germany, scientists showed chess experts and newcomers to different geometric figures and chess positions and measured the reaction of people in the matter of their recognition. They expected the experts' left brain to work much harder, but they didn’t think the right brain would be as active. Reaction times to simple tasks were also the same, but chess experts used both hemispheres of the brain better to respond more quickly to images of chess positions.
Increases creativity
Since the right hemisphere of your brain is responsible for creativity, it shouldn't surprise you that activating it helps you develop creatively. Specifically, chess greatly enhances your originality. For four years, a study was conducted, the essence of which was as follows: students in grades 7-9 had to play chess, use a computer and engage in various activities for 32 weeks, and scientists measured which of the activities provoked the greatest growth in creative thinking. Chess was in first place in all parameters of creativity - the development of originality of thinking won by a wide margin.
Improves your memory
Chess players know that this game improves memory. Being a good player means remembering all the moves that your opponent made, and also remembering all the time which of them might be the most effective on your part in one way or another. These are not only empty words, there is also scientific evidence. In a two-year study in 1985, a group of students were given the opportunity to play chess at any time. As a result, their grades improved in absolutely all subjects, and the teachers noted that these students began to demonstrate better memory and better organizational skills. The same study was repeated with children - and the results were confirmed. Children who played chess got better at memorization, and their verbal skills also improved.
Improves problem solving skills
A chess game is like one big riddle that needs to be solved, and at the same time solved on the go, as your opponent changes conditions all the time. In 1992, within the framework of the study, almost half a thousand schoolchildren were divided into three groups. The first group studied traditional math lessons, the second replaced mathematics with chess, starting from the second grade, and the third - from the first. As a result, in the course of centralized testing, the scores of the third group increased very noticeably, and the third group also surpassed the first in terms of results impressively.
Improves reading skills
Quite often people refer to a 1991 study that examined reading skills in 53 schoolchildren who participated in a chess program. The results were evaluated and compared with those of those children who did not play chess. They clearly showed that playing chess significantly improves reading skills.
Improves concentration
Chess experts may look like scattered, a bit weird scientists, but the truth is that the grimaces they make as they play are the result of the utmost concentration required game process... And it is concentration that you can improve by playing chess. If you get distracted or think about something else even for a moment, this can lead to the fact that you lose the game, since your opponent does not have to report to you exactly how he was like. A large body of research around the world has proven time and time again that the ability to concentrate is improved by playing chess.
Promotes the growth of dendrites
Dendrites are tree-like nerve branches that carry signals from nerve cells to the neurons to which they are attached. You can think of them as antennas that pick up the signal from all the nerve cells in your body. The more of these antennas you have, the more efficiently you can receive signals. Learning new things like playing chess allows dendrites to grow. However, growth will not stop once you master the game. After that, you will be able to compete with other people all the time, and each duel will be different - which is why chess is the perfect way to generate dendrites.
If teenagers play chess, it may even save their lives. One of the elements of the brain that develops last is the prefrontal cortex. This is the part of the brain responsible for planning, judgment, self-control. Thus, adolescents, even scientifically, are immature until they develop this part of the brain. Strategy games such as chess can accelerate the development of the prefrontal cortex and help take better solutions in all areas of life. And this, in turn, may well prevent the commission of the stupid and risky things that are most often associated with adolescence.
There is no doubt that chess has a beneficial effect on the development of mental abilities. The benefits of chess in the development of children and adults have been proven over and over again by many studies and experiments. Impact of chess on intelligence studied in theory and confirmed in practice.
When teaching children and adolescents influence of chess on their intelligence is of key importance not only in development, but also in the formation of a new consciousness. Young people who are open to learning chess begin to reason logically, develop their analytical skills, get used to thinking strategically, and train their memory. For adults, chess helps to keep their mental abilities in good shape, and allows them to hone their previously acquired skills.
One of the key skills that chess gives is the ability to think consistently. Everything that happens on the board during the game is not an accident, and victory in a duel is given to the one who knows how to think over his moves, and not just play at random. In this plan the impact of chess on intelligence obviously. During the game, chess players develop comparative thinking analysis, which is one of the main tools good player... In addition, memory is trained, the ability to see differences in similar situations and similarities in different ones. Since chess is a creative game rather than mathematical, the essence of such skills is not at all about memorizing all possible combinations and moves. The influence of chess on the human brain in this case is manifested in the development of spatial intelligence, rather than in the training of working memory.
Chess teaches you to think. And this ability will manifest itself in the future both in children and adults in various fields of activity. Impact of chess on intelligence a person gives the result not only in the game, but also outside it. Having acquired the skill to think independently and to see in advance the result of one's actions, of course, will come in handy not only in a chess match. Teaching children to play chess has a beneficial effect on their school performance. It is not for nothing that the question of introducing chess into the school curriculum as a compulsory lesson is being raised more and more often. Impact of chess on intelligence especially strong at an early age, it is schoolchildren who can benefit most from this sport.
Over the years, research and experimentation have been carried out to see the practical benefits of chess. Thus, psychologists Alfred Binet and Petr Rudik, while studying the benefits of chess for the brain, were reliably convinced and proved that chess players do not form rote memorization, but logical and analytical thinking. Impact of chess on intelligence and intelligence in general is being studied to this day. So, in last years Doctors have taken up chess as a tool in the fight against a serious illness - Alzheimer's disease. This disease, according to scientists, can be defeated by maintaining mental activity in an active state for as long as possible. As a prevention of disease, chess is an ideal tool, as it promotes the activation of cognitive functions, the development of memory, attention and areas of the brain responsible for making decisions.
Impact of chess on intelligence will certainly have a beneficial effect at any age. Whenever you choose the path of a chess player for yourself, it will bear worthy results.
