CROSSWORDS: General Health; Cognitive Fitness

Summary | Quotes |
References: General | Aging; Dementia

Summary

• Learning a skill, playing a game or solving a new kind of problem can improve
  mental flexibility, mood and brain connections -- and burn a few extra brain calories.
• Welcome distraction from disasters, wars, pandemics.
• Solving crosswords might aid in concentration, and ability to recognize patterns.
• Although solving puzzles might not prevent dementia, practicing
  and constantly challenging yourself appears to add to your "cognitive reserve",
  possibly delaying the onset of symptoms in some studies, e.g.,
  Study Finds Crossword Puzzles May Improve Memory Better Than Other Brain Games
• Up your game to different and more difficult crosswords (sources)
• Diversify to different kinds of puzzles, e.g., acrostics, cryptics, etc.
• Even more challenging and fun -- construct crosswords!

Quotes

• Crossword puzzles satisfy... 45 fundamental desires of the human species.
  ~a Columbia University psychologist
• "I don't want to retire... I'm not that good at crossword puzzles." ~Norman Mailer
• "Solving crosswords eliminates... worries.
  They make you a calmer and more focused person." ~Will Shortz
• "The little boxes on a crossword puzzle could be seen as the...
  hours of our lives, to be filled in from the information, names, events, locations,
  people, all the memories stored in our minds throughout our life experience.
  Like a crossword, through a day or a life, there are all kinds of questions
  to respond to, odds and ends of stimuli along the way, some easy, some hard,
  that come at us." ~Linda Johnson
• Chicago's health commissioner... endorsed crosswords as a means of calming the nerves.
• "More frequent puzzlers had better...
  long-term memory and could more easily recall emotions and context, not just facts.
  They also excelled at spatial working memory tests -- tasks like remembering details
  about the physical environment in which something occurred -- and had better attention,
  processing speed, and executive function. While taking a moment every day to pick up a
  puzzle and challenge your brain is ideal, doing something on occasion is better than nothing, too.
  The performance of those who never did puzzles was 'significantly inferior' to those
  who did puzzles at all, the researchers found."
  ~Studies: One daily habit may help your brain beat the effects of aging
• "Crossword puzzles start...
  the daily routine gentle
  exercise of brain" ~Crossword haiku 1/26/2012
• "[Loraine Atherton, 107] spends every spare moment of her time... in her room doing crossword puzzles.
  She has every book. She also competes against other residents at crossword puzzles with
  a device that allows for group play on a television. She can beat anybody in that room.
  Her mind is that sharp." ~New year is 107th for Greenfield woman
• "If you have an active mind, it always helps.
  You know, people who don't do crosswords,... their minds fall asleep.
  That's why I do them -- my mind is always working.
  One day my brain is going to explode through the top of my head." ~Brett Hull
• "We don't stop playing because we grow old,... we grow old because we stop playing."
  ~George Bernard Shaw
• "I'm taking memory power boost tablets... to help me every day and
  doing the puzzles to help me stay focused." ~Terry Bradshaw
• "I would prefer to live forever in perfect health,... but if I must at some time leave this life,
  I would like to do so ensconced on a chaise longue, perfumed, wearing a velvet robe and pearl earrings,
  with a flute of champagne beside me and having just discovered the answer to the last problem
  in a British cryptic crossword." ~Olivia De Havilland
• "Where nothing in a person's earlier years lends itself to an old age
  devoted to continuing intellectual and physical pursuits,... a late-life interest in Tolstoy
  or even crossword puzzles is unlikely to appear, no matter the urging by well-intentioned
  social workers or people like me who write books about it." ~Sherwin B. Nuland
• "When you challenge the brain, you increase
  the number of brain cells and the number of connections between those cells.
  But... it's not enough to do the things you routinely do -- like the daily crossword.
  You have to learn new things." ~Keith L. Black, M.D., chair of neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
• "Q. Any special exercises for your nose?...
  A. Crossword puzzles...You don't really smell with the nose, it's just the channel.
  Your brain deciphers what you smell." ~Ray Matts, haute fragrance designer
• "In difficult times, when life begins to feel out of control or... when faced with an emotional dilemma,
  working on something that has finite answers can provide a sense of security...
  Human brains are hard-wired to fill in blanks when they see them." ~Helen R. Friedman
• "I do the 'New York Times' crossword puzzle...
  every morning to keep the old grey matter ticking." ~Carol Burnett
• "People say, well, they're doing crossword puzzles. That's great, but...
  if they've done crossword puzzles of the same kind for a year or so, that's not a challenge.
  You need something that's a little harder, where you have to work."
  ~Marian Diamond, Professor of neuroscience and anatomy at Cal's Dept. of Integrative Biology
  and a pioneer in research on brain enrichment
• "I don't have any trouble memorizing lines... because of the crossword puzzles
  I do every day to keep my mind a little limber." ~Betty White
• "I should go to bed so I can get an early start... on the crossword puzzle tomorrow," he thought, oldly.
• "It's why you're supposed to do crossword puzzles and... exercise and learn a musical instrument.
  If you're not bilingual but you're active and engaged, you're getting cognitive reserve.
  [But] Nobody spends all day every day doing crossword puzzles, but everybody spends
  all day every day talking. It's a way to get massive doses of this stimulating [executive functioning]
  activity without doing anything special." ~Ellen Bialystok, York University

References

• sections: Dementia; Alzheimers
• Will Shortz Is Back in the Game
  The Times' crossword-puzzle editor returns to work — and table tennis —
  after two strokes that nearly ended his career; Vulture; 3/12/2025
• Crossword Editor Will Shortz Shares How He's Recovering from Stroke puzzles, Ping-Pong, and physical therapy are the keys to his recovery from stroke; 10/3/2024
• Packers Star Aaron Rodgers, In a Candid Conversation With Danica Patrick, Shared How Crossword helps with Concussions 6/4/2022
• Doing Puzzles Can Help Solve Your Other Problems, Too Time; 5/5/2022
• Why crossword puzzles have become my safe space as a Black man 3/26/2022
• Judi Dench health: 'I can't do a crossword' Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD); 3/18/2022
• This Is What Martha Stewart Does Every Morning for Better Brain Health a crossword; 1/26/2022
• Escaping Into the Crossword Puzzle
  'Black-and-White Thinking'; Anna Shechtman; NewYorker; 12/20/2021
• Why You Gravitate to Puzzles When You're Depressed
  Puzzle games keep our minds occupied, even in our darkest moments.
  Here's why they make you feel better, more capable, and more optimistic about life; Wired; 11/20/2021
• She's 100 and 'whips butt' on crossword puzzles. What's her secret? 9/8/2021
• Drinking tea sharpens ability to solve puzzles Times; 8/25/2021
• Boost your brainpower with old-school puzzles and games 3/1/2021
• To 'Keep Sharp' This Year, Keep Learning, Advises Neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta NPR; 1/4/2021
• Reading software code activates the part of your brain used for crossword puzzles
  and logic problems ZD; 12/17/2020
• My Journey to the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament
  a well-loved clipboard loaded with crossword puzzles
  became the rock one woman leaned on when her husband became critically ill;
  'When days were long, doctors' visits were discouraging and the future was uncertain,
  crossword puzzles gave me a sense of accomplishment, comfort and stability.' NYT; 11/25/2020
• From surgery recovery to easing anxiety, the surprising health benefits of a crossword Tel; 11/12/2020
• Soothe your election nerves by solving NYT crossword puzzles together on Twitch
  calming soundtrack and positive atmosphere in the chat; Verge; 11/4/2020
• A crossword a day keeps the brain fog at bay 10/4/2020
• Queen Elizabeth Responds to 7-Year-Old Boy Who Made Her a "Happiness Crossword"
  "He sent it with a letter saying how she might be feeling sad or lonely because of lockdown..."; 7/11/2020
• Woodturning helps one Homer resident recover after stroke I was doing a crossword puzzle
  and I said to somebody else in the room what's a nine-letter word for blah blah blah?
  And he rolls over and tells me the answer. I knew right then he was in there; 6/10/2020
• Before Bed: Designer Clare Vivier Self-Soothes With Crosswords and a Candle Vogue; 4/8/2020
• This Is Your Brain on Crosswords
  Those black-and-white squares can help us understand how memory works; episodic buffer,
  a liaison between short- and long-term memory that basically integrates both verbal and
  visuospatial information; especially the crossword experts, appeared to use both verbal and
  visuospatial components of their short-term memory—that is, that instead of separating out
  visual cues from verbally processed ones, the crossworders were integrating both types of
  perceptions in their short-term memories; SciAm; 3/17/2020
• Sudoku, crossword and confinement, Michigan woman describes life on quarantined cruise line 3/3/2020
• Times crossword is the daily solution to Derek Jacobi's sharp mind Times; 2/18/2020
• Puzzles, games, and new activities can keep your brain healthy. Plus, they're fun!
  emphasis on new challenges; 1/30/2020
• Mind fuel: Can you think yourself thinner? burn more calories by solving crosswords? 1/29/2020
• John Cannon: Exercise mind, body 1/7/2020
• New year is 107th for Greenfield woman Loraine Atherton b. 1/1/1913; same year as 1st crossword; 1/6/2020
• Trouble with crossword puzzles? Improve your semantic memory Harvard; 12/10/2019
• Prison’s Tips for Inmates in Solitary: 'Plant a Tree' or 'Go on a Picnic'
  For now, the penitentiary has decided to instead include softcover library books as part of the materials
  distributed to inmates as they enter solitary confinement -- along with crossword puzzles; NYT; 11/16/2019
• How Crosswords Put Your Brain Into Hyperdrive NYkr; 9/16/2019
• Keeping Anxiety at Bay by ‘Hitting the Squares'
  When the panic attacks began and life decisions became overwhelming,
  solving crosswords helped halt the intrusive thoughts; NYT; 9/15/2019
• Out of the Fog: How Solving Puzzles Cured My 'Mommy Brain'
  a mother of a toddler loses her grip on words until crossword puzzles helped bring them back; NYT; 6/26/2019
• Crossword queen Bunny is 104 across and never down!
  "I do a cryptic crossword every day to keep my mind active and a lot of reading.
  The residents at Ironside Walk call me the Crossword Queen"; 5/17/2019
• Regular crosswords and number puzzles linked to sharper brain in later life
  the more regularly adults aged 50 and over played puzzles such as crosswords and Sudoku,
  the better they performed on tasks assessing attention, reasoning and memory, according to
  research in more than 19,000 participants, led by the University of Exeter and King's College London;
  published in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry; 5/16/2019
• Your Job May Affect How Your Brain Ages 'crossword puzzle maker' among 43 occupations
  scored as 'High Cognitive Engagement'; 538; 11/19/2014
• Crosswords and puzzles do not prevent mental decline, study says
  such pursuits will not necessarily act as a preventative, but they could still provide
  a "higher cognitive point" from which to decline; CNN; 12/20/2018
• Crossword-Solving: A Search for Connections and Answers NYT; 2/14/2017
• How to Become a 'Superager' do challenging activities; NYT; 12/31/2016
• Brain Game Claims Fail A Big Scientific Test NPR; 10/3/2016
• For Effective Brain Fitness, Do More Than Play Simple Games
  novelty and complexity; social interaction important; 'brain fitness' courses? NYT; 7/8/2016
• Learning a New Sport May Be Good for the Brain NYT; 3/2/2016
• Using Card and Board Games to Keep Minds Sharp chess, bridge, poker; NYT; 12/4/2015
• Can You Get Smarter? brain training and social integration can slow decline; NYT; 10/23/2015
• Psychologists compare the mental abilities of Scrabble and crossword champions
  both equal at verbal and visuospatial working memory; some differences; 9/12/2014
• Did You Know? 10 Fun Facts About The Oldest Living Man
  Mr. Salustiano Sanchez (d. 9/13/2013); #8: hobbies include crosswords; Guin; 7/25/2013
• Puzzles help 'boost earning power'
  "Research shows that completing puzzles and other mental games sharpens the brain by improving
  concentration, memory, level of alertness, recall of detail, recognition of patterns and speed of reaction time.
  When undertaken with others, improved team-playing is also added to the list of benefits"; 9/16/2012
• How crossword puzzles mess with your mind
  the agony and the ecstasy of solving a crossword puzzle can reflect a surprising amount about
  the subconscious mind; NewSci; 12/20/2011
• Top 10 Tips and Tricks to Train, Exercise, and Better Your Brain
  Sudoku; Wikipedia:Random; Simple Math; Write Instead of Type (More Often); Act Like You're Teaching;
  Tell Yourself Stories; Lumosity app; Meditate; Learn About Your Brain's Faults and Account for Them;
  Exercise and Eat Well; LH; 1/29/2011
• NYT: No Memory, but He Filled In the Blanks learning after brain damage; NYT; 12/7/2010
• Cross-Worditis Gets Official Attention from Health Bureau Tampa (FL) Times, p. 7; 3/11/1925
• Cross-Word Headache Booms Optical Trade New Strain on Eyes Reveals Defects in Vision, as Did the Early Motion Pictures; NYT p. 20; 12/22/1924

Aging; Dementia

• Will Stimulating My Brain as I Age Keep It Sharp? NYT; 3/27/2025
• What Happens to Your Brain When You Retire? NYT; 3/26/2025
• Can Crosswords and Games Prevent Dementia? experts say the answer is a puzzle; NYT; 10/30/2024
• A Longitudinal Analysis of the Relationship Between Different Levels of Cognitively Stimulating Leisure Activity and Cognitive Function Among Older Adults with MCI 7/5/2024
• Your Mind on Wordle
  word games may or may not prevent dementia, but they offer
  many other benefits to the psyche; AARP Bulletin; Jul/Aug 2024
• Not black and white: are crossword puzzles really good for your brain? Guardian; 1/22/2024
• Getting Myself Back, One Puzzle at a Time
  after a devastating injury damaged his cognitive abilities, word games
  helped the author build new ways to shape his thoughts; NYT; 12/4/2023
• Tai chi helps boost memory, study finds. One type seems most beneficial
  effect doubled with word game; NPR; 11/6/2023
• Digital puzzle games could be good for memory in older adults
  older adults who play digital puzzle games have the same memory
  abilities as people in their 20s, a new study has shown; 8/14/2023
• Puzzles And Games Cut Dementia Risk -- But Socializing With Friends And Family Barely Helps, Study Finds Forbes; 7/14/2023
• Advice from Ireland’s oldest person, 109-year-old Máirín Hughes: Regular crosswords and live life to the full 5/22/2023
• Secrets of 'SuperAgers' with superior memories into their 80s CNN; 11/26/2022
• Study Finds Crossword Puzzles May Improve Memory Better Than Other Brain Games Prev; 11/5/2022
• Slowing Memory Loss: Crossword Puzzles Beat Cognitive Computer Video Games 10/27/2022
• Playing word games regularly can give a person the daily challenge
  needed to 'keep your memory and your thinking sharp', expert says 4/27/2022
• Maintaining a cognitively active lifestyle 3/23/2022
• Dementia treatment: Can a daily crossword-a-day reduce symptoms? Fact checked
  ...Based on this theory, while crosswords do not necessarily stop people
  from developing dementia, they can help to create a 'higher cognitive point'.
  The findings suggest that although crosswords will not entirely protect you
  from dementia, they can still be beneficial towards overall cognitive function; 11/11/2021
• Daily crossword a key to long life says 100-year-old after Scotsman tribute 10/11/2021
• What's a four-letter word ... MT; 5/30/2021
• Can a Puzzle a Day Keep Dementia at Bay?
  "The Bronx 20-year longitudinal Aging Study found that self-reported crossword puzzle use
  was associated with a 2.54 year delay in dementia onset"; 7/15/2019
• At 104, feisty Helen Marrese of Rockland swears by 'a crossword puzzle a day'
  a top-three reason for longevity; 8/3/2021
• Crosswords may hold solution to delaying dementia
  "people who are most intellectually active in later life appear to delay the onset of dementia by as much as five years";
  Times; 7/15/2021
• Brain Exercises That Work
  1. Do a Crossword Puzzle; Forbes; 7/9/2021
• The Secrets of 'Cognitive Super-Agers'
  factors for cognitive reslience: higher level/better quality education;
  choosing occupations that deal with complex facts and data;
  consuming a Mediterranean-style diet; maintaining a healthy weight, not smoking;
  engaging in leisure activities (cognitively new and challenging to the brain);
  socializing with other people; exercising regularly; NYT; 6/21/2021
• Pursuing Leisure Activities May Not Protect Against Dementia NYT; 11/3/2020
• Alzheimer drugs are great, but taking control of your brain is better 8/16/2020
• 5 Measures That May Lower Your Alzheimer's Risk
  exercise, not smoking, moderate drinking, a Mediterranean diet and mentally stimulating activities; NYT; 6/23/2020
• Studies: One daily habit may help your brain beat the effects of aging
  More frequent puzzlers had better long-term memory and could more easily recall emotions and context,
  not just facts. They also excelled at spatial working memory tests -- tasks like remembering details about
  the physical environment in which something occurred -- and had better attention, processing speed,
  and executive function; 12/24/2019
• Almost Half of Older Americans Fear Dementia
  crossword lovers might be the kind of people who maintain a generally "cognitively stimulating" life
  -- and there is evidence to support benefits from doing so; more 'cognitive reserve'? WebMD; 11/15/2019
• Steps to Prevent Dementia May Mean Taking Actual Steps
  Brain-training apps can't match the several ways that exercise benefits the mind, research shows; NYT; 10/21/2019
• How Advocates And Editors Used A Word Game To Reach 50 Million People About Alzheimer's Disease
  'Hardest Crossword': "Only one person knows all the answers, but she doesn’t remember them anymore";
  Alzheimer's Foundation of America (AFA) puzzle site: Katherine, Marie, Pat; Forbes; 6/27/2019
• Supplements Won't Prevent Dementia. But These Steps Might.
  increased physical activity; blood pressure management for people with hypertension,
  particularly in midlife; cognitive training ('something you enjoy where you're learning something
  new, challenging and stimulating your brain'; brain training apps not proven useful); NYT; 3/1/2019
• Can Dementia Be Prevented? Education May Bolster Brain Against Risk NPR; 2/11/2016
• For an Aging Brain, Looking for Ways to Keep Memory Sharp
  even the widely acclaimed value of doing crossword puzzles has been called into question, beyond its
  unmistakable benefit to one's font of miscellaneous knowledge. Although there is some evidence
  that doing crosswords may help to delay memory decline, Molly Wagster, a neuroscientist at the
  National Institute on Aging, said they are best done for personal pleasure, not brain health.
  'People who have done puzzles all their lives have no particular cognitive advantage over anyone else,'
  she said.; NYT; 5/11/2015
• Can crossword puzzles prevent dementia? Clinical Correlations: The NYU Langone Online Journal of Medicine; 3/12/2014
• Crosswords could knock 10 years off brain and delay dementia brain training study; 1/14/2014
• Do Crossword Puzzles Really Stave Off Dementia? NPR Morning Edition; audio: 5:00; NPR; 12/20/2013
• Keeping brain sharp may ward off Alzheimer's protein
  (but "starting crossword puzzles late won't help"); Reut; 1/24/2012
• Association of crossword puzzle participation with memory decline in persons who develop dementia
  Pillai, J.A., et al.; J Int Neuropsychol Soc, 2011. 17(6): p. 1006-13; 11/2011
• Interview: neurologist Martin Samuels brain and aging:
  "There's no evidence that doing the New York Times crossword puzzle prevents Alzheimer's."; 4/15/2010
• Leisure Activities and the Risk of Dementia in the Elderly N Engl J Med 2003;348:2508-16
• Patients with Alzheimer's disease have reduced activities in midlife compared with healthy control-group members
  intellectually challenging hobbies may help prevent Alzheimer's; paper; 3/6/2001