What Is Lumosity?

Introduction

Lumosity is basically an online brain-training program, which consists of games to help in the improvement of flexibility, memory, attention span, the speed of processing information, quick problem-solving, and decision-making techniques. Lumos Labs was founded in the year 2005 by David Drescher, Kunal Sarkar, and Michael Scanlon.

They launched their website called “lumosity.com” in the year 2007. By January 2015, they had at least 70 million members who took part of the online games. It is believed that Lumos Labs helps keep the brains of people challenged through simple online tools, which would allow anyone to get trained on their core cognitive abilities. There are many diverse disciplines, which combine neuroscience and visual art. Brain training programs such as Lumosity keeps the brain engaged to improve cognitive abilities.

Team

Today, Lumosity has been used by over 90 million people across the world. It offers a wide range of brain-training programs, which consists of more than 30 brain games. Lumosity is a team of game designers and scientists, who explore and create new ways to challenge the brain and push cognitive research forward.

Scientists at Lumos Labs take the common cognitive and neuropsychological tasks and design entirely new tasks or challenges. The designers transform these tasks developed by the scientists into fun games that can challenge an individual's core cognitive skills. Lumos Labs also works with various universities worldwide. They provide qualified researchers almost free access to the training tools of Lumosity to help them investigate newer areas of cognition.

Lumosity Mobile Application

The mobile application has daily workouts, which are drawn from around more than 30 games that challenge five core cognitive abilities. Each workout mode has carefully curated a set of games, which use the individual's training habits and preferences to target various ways in brain training.

The mobile application is available in English, French, Portuguese, Japanese, Spanish, and German languages. English is the default language for devices that support other languages. You can also change the language of the app by carrying out certain changes in the settings of the device.

Do these brain-training games really work?

First, let's ask what are these new age brain games setting in for? Does brain-training really work in the real world? Lumosity and few other brain-training online games are mostly built on the platform of psychological tests. These tests are used to determine how the inner workings of the mind work. Other games such as the N-back test is designed to measure working memory and capacity. The Stroop Color and Word Test (SCWT) is carried out to measure cognitive flexibility and selective attention. 

Psychological tests do not offer a comprehensive coverage of the intelligence or the capabilities of the brain. This area is something that is not completely understood yet. The point of carrying out or going through the games offered by Lumosity is to improve the overall IQ of an individual. However, there is still no clear correlation between them. 

There is a level of self-confidence attached while carrying out the tests. It has a placebo effect, wherein one believes that by carrying out the tests and also getting better in them would lead to an improvement in the quality of life and overall brain development of an individual.

There is still research going on in this area, particularly about the exact intention of the test and the serious effects it would have on the capabilities of the brain including the alteration of the intention in a meaningful method. While Lumosity may not lead to a direct impact, but somewhere, it can indirectly make a lot of difference if one needs that boost in their self-confidence.

There have been certain reviews, which confirm that brain cognitive training tends to work by carrying out these online games. Certain people have benefitted in a way wherein brain fog has decreased. It has also led to an increase in brain power such as improved memory and focus. However, the effects also differ from person-to-person since it involves other factors such as maintaining healthy habits, personality, outlook, awareness, and genetics.

A person who is a non-negative thinker would see that there are a lot of potential or benefits along with motivation of scores as the games progress. Our brain can be described as a muscle, therefore training provided to the muscle would help in the longevity and increases the effectiveness of the brain as similar to the rest of the body. If you feed your brain with motivation, good perspective, nutrients, and essential exercises, then it would surely perform much better over time. 

Lumosity Website

To gain access to their online brain games, you need to sign up and provide some basic information such as gender, academic studies, current profession, and how you heard about Lumosity. Apart from these details, other basic questions include how often you exercise, the time of the day when you are most productive, the devices that you will use for the Lumosity training program, and how long you sleep at night.

Once the above basic questions are answered, they would lead you to the next step, wherein they would take your fit test in terms of flexibility, attention span, memory, and results. Each of these fit test levels would have games to understand an individual's brain fitness.

Lumosity Games

The cognitive training program of Lumos Labs contains a number of online brain games, wherein each game is divided into categories of Speed, Memory, Attention, Flexibility, and Problem-Solving. Not all of the games would be available to every user. To gain complete access, you must avail their special packages with paid registration. You can register for monthly, yearly, or it can be a one-time lifetime payment. By choosing any of these subscriptions, you can enjoy the full training program with unlocked games.

There is also an intelligent recommendation generated for workouts. The Lumosity algorithm is known to generate various sets of workouts based on the individual’s preferences and training habits. This can be decided based on the questions asked in the program or one would need to go through certain gaming sessions. There are insight reports, which are tailored to provide a deeper understanding of what the training is all about and the levels of achievement.

There are over fifty cognitive games provided by Lumosity. These games have a variety of challenges, which are designed by scientists and game designers to adapt to one’s experiences and skills. There are also tools provided by the website that would help track the progress of the training. It keeps a track of all the scores to see how one has performed in comparison with others and the changes made over a period of time. For those with paid registrations, they would be allowed to access new features or games created by Lumosity along with providing experimental tools.

Below is the list of online brain games, which are available in various cognitive training sessions:

• Speed: Under this category, information processing, spatial orientation, testing visualization, speed match, and spatial speed match are tested.

• Memory: Games are based on working memory and spatial recall.

• Attention: This category has games based on the division of attention, field of view, and selective attention.

• Flexibility: This cognitive training category includes games based on verbal fluency, response inhibition, and task switching.

• Problem-solving: This training category includes games that are based on logical reasoning, planning, spatial reasoning, numerical calculation, and quantitative reasoning.

• Language: This category involves games that test vocabulary proficiency, reading comprehension, and verbal fluency.

• Classics: Involves classic games such as logical reasoning, task switching, field of view, workout exercise for memory, spatial recall, and planning.