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This is a headache.
Wordle, the New York Times’ cognitive word game, is taking a toll on players’ mental health.
“My therapist said the NYT word game app has been a problem for many of her patients, including me,” says journalist Tess Owen I wrote to X This week, she admitted to “lying” to her therapist about how much time she spent playing a number of the games provided by the Times.
imitate therapist owen continuation, “Well, to sum it up, you do Sudoku, as well as Crosswords, Spelling Bee, Wardle, Connections, and Letterbox every day in just an hour?” *writes in notebook* ”
The Times offers a range of word and number games including but not limited to crosswords, mini crosswords, spelling bees, tiles, strands and connections. This is probably the most intellectually outrageous spread due to even the slightest protest from players. Too Always hard.
The newspaper told The Daily Beast that its games were played more than 8 billion times in 2023, with Wordle being by far the most popular, but at what cost?
Jennifer Gittleman, a psychologist in New York, said word puzzles, which The Times acquired from software engineer Josh Wardle in 2022, dominate some patients’ lives and “disturb their regularly scheduled programming.” ”
“What I see as a problem is when patients say, “I couldn’t complete my work tasks today because I spent so much time on Wordle,” or they invited me out to dinner with a friend, but they can’t do it on their own. That’s when I said I chose to stay home to play Connections,” she told The Daily Beast, adding that some patients can’t solve the puzzles or don’t have enough time to complete them. He added that it makes him feel anxious.
Other therapists told the outlet that their patients are filled with fears that their friends will judge them for getting a low score or taking too long to complete a game.
When this sensational game first took off, ‘wordle boasting’ became a social media phenomenon, where people brag about their scores on platforms like X and compare them to their peers.
“So instead of perhaps looking for something within themselves, people are looking for external validation or something from other people,” psychologist Lauren Sweitzer, Ph.D., told The Daily Beast. . “On the flip side, it’s self-judgment that makes you feel terrible about what people are doing.”
A spokesperson said the games were “based on wordplay and logic” and were not intended to offend people. Instead, they “intentionally make time to share with friends and family.”
“We believe deeply that this is a type of play that is healthy and brings people together,” the Times told The Daily Beast.
Cognitive puzzles like Wordle appear to increase cognition and intelligence, but experts previously told CNN that mastering Wordle doesn’t make you good at anything else.
“Some people just enjoy puzzles,” University of Calgary psychology professor Penny Pexman told CNN. “And we know that cognitive needs are different from intelligence, which means you’re not necessarily doing it because you’re smart, you’re doing it because it’s fun.”
This game is different from crossword-like puzzles where you have to complete word definitions and associations. According to experts, Wordle uses deductive reasoning to solve missing letters, tapping into the frontal lobe and prefrontal cortex.
Wordle requires concentration and visual memory, but strategizing can reduce the mental load associated with the game, “reducing the potential benefits of Wordle,” he said. The researcher, Aaron Seitz, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside, told CNN.
He recommends rotating the games you play when you don’t feel like your brain is being challenged to “train your brain in different ways.”
But if you just can’t quit Wordle, Gittleman advises setting a time limit so the puzzles don’t “get in the way.”
“People just have to remember, it’s just a game,” she said.
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