Scrabble has been a favorite board game for young and old and everyone in between right from the time it was first conceived 80 years ago. This simple yet challenging 2-4 player word centric board game basically consists of a board with some squares and letters. Each player is dealt 7 letters at a time to create words and set them in appropriate slots on the board just like a crossword game.
Each square letter in the game is emblazoned with a number, and the player with the highest total number along with any multipliers takes home the gold! Apart from increasing intelligence levels, boosting social interaction and needless to say increasing your vocabulary, recent research indicates that Scrabble can actually increase brain power!
Playing Scrabble Works your Brain Differently
A study from the University of Calgaryindicated that Scrabble players process words differently than others. There are three components an adult literate relies on to read and process a word—sound, spelling and meaning. This study indicated that Scrabblers were able to identify real words over ones that didn’t make sense 20 percent faster and more accurately than non-Scrabble players.
This is due to the fact that Scrabblers used a different part of their brain for the exercise, where unlike non-Scrabblerswho used the language area of their brain, they usedparts of the brain that weregeared towards visual processing and working memory. The results of this study proved that the human brain is extremely flexible, where different areas can be used to perform the same task.
So in case an individual’s language area of the brain is damaged due to trauma, stroke, etc, they can always try and leverage the benefits of these alternate areas like Scrabblers do to perform the same task. And even though Scrabble has moved from good old boards to apps, the bottom line is that “Words still Matter, their meaning doesn’t”.
Can using Scrabble Cheat Sheets Up your Brain Game?
Even though Scrabble is a word centric board game, players do not necessarily need to know the meaning of the words they create, but just knowing that they exist can help rack up the points. Take for example the word “MUZJIK”, which means “Russian Peasant”, but Scrabblers don’t need to know that, because all that matters is that the word exists and is worth a total of 128 points.
Words with a higher point value are hard to come across, especially if they’re unheard of. But there are Scrabble Word Finder Guide that can help players learn new words, some often that are three and four letters long and with a higher value. The big question with using cheat sheets is that whether they can enhance your brain game. And the short answer is “Yes” and here’s why!
Given that Scrabble aficionados use their brain’s visual and memory components rather than language, using Scrabble cheat sheets can actually accelerate both areas. And given that Scrabble players do not have to know the meaning of the words, they simply can rely solely on their memory to dish out the right ones. Of course, knowing the meaning of the words used could greatly improve you vocabulary, but when it comes to playing Scrabble, it is fair game if you use your memory skills to know that they are indeed Real words.
