The Playful Brain: The Surprising Science of How Puzzles Improve Your Mind - Hardcover

Restak, Richard, M.D.; Kim, Scott

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1594487774 ISBN 13: 9781594487774

Publisher: Riverhead Books, 2010

Synopsis

This is your brain on puzzles...A leading neuroscientist and a noted puzzle designer team up to reveal how solving puzzles improves your brain function.

It's no secret that puzzles are fun to solve. But when Dr. Richard Restak, a respected neuroscientist, discovered new research that proved puzzles could actually help the brain improve itself, he wondered: Could puzzles help arrest mental deterioration? And do different types of puzzles enhance different parts of the brain?

As Restak was investigating the benefits of puzzles, Scott Kim, a world-renowned puzzle developer, also became fascinated by the potential for puzzles to keep the brain nimble. Now these two experts at the top of their fields have collaborated on an engaging and informative book that gives readers the chance to work puzzles while learning how to boost their brain. For example, readers will find out:

?How to solve puzzles for maximum brain improvement.

?The benefits of trial and error on your brain.

?The different kinds of memory you use to solve puzzles.

?The pitfalls that interfere with memory and how to avoid them.

Kim's puzzles and Restak's illuminating prose combine to make The Playful Brain a lively book of popular science that will sharpen anyone's thinking and memory skills.

About this title

About the Author:

Richard Restak M.D., is an award-winning neuroscientist, neuropsychi-atrist, and writer. The best-selling author of nineteen acclaimed books about the brain, including Think Smart and Mozart's Brain and the Fighter Pilot, he has also penned dozens of articles for a variety of publications, among them The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and USA Today. A fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Neurology, and the American Neuropsychiatric Association, he lives and practices in Washington, D.C.
Scott Kim is a puzzle and computer game designer, artist, and author. He wrote the "Boggier" column for Discover magazine for ten years and has created hundreds of puzzles for magazines such as Scientific American and Games. Kim, who has a B.A. in music and a Ph.D. in computers and graphic design, both from Stanford, has designed puzzles for hit computer games including Bejeweled and Tetris, and is a game designer at the brain-game company Lumos Labs. He lives in California.

About this edition

• Publisher: Riverhead Books
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1594487774
• ISBN 13: 9781594487774
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 294