Brain Games Reveal Clues On How The Mind Works

Scientists are using supercomputers and data from the game Ebb and Flow to train deep learning models that mimic the human behavior of “task-switching,” shifting attention from one task to another. This research is important for understanding cognitive control and diseases such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Paul Jaffe and Russell Poldrack developed a new and more realistic model of task-switching that imposes fewer assumptions on how the brain goes about doing a particular task.