Blindfold Cubing Research Study

Hello Everyone,

I am a PhD student in Cognitive Psychology, and I am thinking of doing a study on working memory and blindfold cubing. I don't have any details yet, nor have I decided whether this is going to be just a case study or a project with quantitative rigor. I just learned about blindfold cubing, and I think that it's a spectacular feat, which could provide a great deal of insight into various interesting aspects of cognition, memory, and spatial reasoning.

However, before I can even write an official proposal, I need to assure my faculty of the feasibility of this research by demonstrating that I can recruit enough participants. Therefore, I would like to find out how many people out there are able to solve the cube blindfolded, would be willing to participate, and are located in (or near) New York City. So, if you think that you might be interested, please shoot me an email with your name (real, or otherwise) and your age (actually, I only need to know if you are over 18 or not, because there are additional review board documents that I will need to complete if I am working with minors). And, of course, all communications are strictly confidential, and additional details are forthcoming.

Thanks a bunch,

Irina Paley
[email protected]

For a 3x3, it is much easier than you think; I thought it was crazy hard until I found out how to do it. The guys who do 6x6 and 7x7 are a different story...thats just crazy man.

anyway, I am 41, able to do it badly at best, do not live near N.Y. and can't participate. I would however, be very interested in following you research.

As far as I can envision the initial study design, the size of the cube would be irrelevant. But being able to complete it in reasonable time (I am thinking, under 30 minutes, which is a pretty long time to be blindfolded anyway) is important, strictly for practical reasons.

- Irina

the vast majority of people who can BLD 3x3 need less than 10 minutes, so half an hour is definitely long enough.
im sure there are plenty who would. This is a very active forum, so expect many replies in the next day or two...
good luck

this researcher needs someone in new york. so it's not about whether you can sub 30 execution, it's where you live.

and if you're willing to help.

Blindfold cubing really is a spectacular feat, but if you learn it, you will know that it's not so hard. You only need to memorise 15-20 Letters/Numbers or 8-9 Image Pairs or you can use visual memo and only keep it them your mind for less than 2 minutes. The important thing is not to make an execution mistake.

And it has absolutely nothing to do with thinking ahead of your moves or thinking where the pieces will be after you do some moves.

nitrocan said:

And it has absolutely nothing to do with thinking ahead of your moves or thinking where the pieces will be after you do some moves.

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I disagree. During execution you should be thinking about what you're next moves will be, then you won't have pauses...

I don't know if you can just get people to meet in NYC, perhaps you can come to a competition that is somewhat close?

Blindfold cubing is about
1. understanding the concepts first
2. memorize the cube, it's not just looking at one face at a time and memorize all the colors, it's much easier. You just look at the path that pieces cycle and memorize that, so it is actually just 15-20 pieces to cycle on average. And you are a psychologist, so you know all the memory techniques.
Cognition--recognize the piece and know where it belongs.
3. execution-- I guess there is some spatial thinking involved to setup the pieces to a place you know so you can cycle it.

Off the top of my head I know of Tyson Mao and Rowe Hessler.

You should get in touch with Bob Burton (his email is listed on the World Cube Association website). He should be familiar with cubers on the east coast/in the NYC area and should be able to recommend more people. He knows how to blindfold solve as well.

When are you looking to do this study? There is a tournament in Valhalla, NY on the 22nd of November. It's in Westchester, just outside of NYC. There will probably be a least 10 people there capable of solving a cube and I'm sure most (including me) would be happy to help your study.

Thanks for your excellent responses. I will follow up with the people that you recommended. Thanks for that lead. It didn't occur to me to attend a tournament in the area, but that's an outstanding suggestion, although I think that a lot of what I had in mind actually requires that participants come to campus.

You see, my primary area of interest is cognitive neuroscience, and most of my proposals basically consist of finding people who can do something somewhat extraordinary, and looking at their brains through EEG or fMRI techniques.

So, I thought that people who can solve the cube blindfolded would have enhanced spatial memory, and would, therefore, have a larger hippocampus relative to the overall brain size, as compared to individuals who are not able to solve the cube. This is based, primarily, on old studies of hoarding animals versus non-hoarding animals with same size brains. A modified hypothesis, based on a 2000 study of London taxi drivers, would speculate that folks proficient at solving the cube blindfolded would have an enlarged posterior hippocampus. Either one of those outcomes would be incredibly cool, I think.

I realize that the notion of going into an fMRI machine might dissuade some potential participants, but on the other hand, it might serve as an incentive for others. Regardless, that portion of the study would come later (which is an academic term for, much much much later, maybe next summer, if ever). So, for now, I am really just looking to see how many people would be interested in participating in something relatively mild - surveys, interviews, an assortment of cognitive and memory tasks, that sort of thing, with the understanding that such participation does not obligate you toward anything more elaborate in the future, and does not preclude you from it either.

Again, thanks to all who have responded.

- Irina

irinaatcolumbia said:

So, I thought that people who can solve the cube blindfolded would have enhanced spatial memory, and would, therefore, have a larger hippocampus relative to the overall brain size, as compared to individuals who are not able to solve the cube.

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You realize that anyone could solve the cube, right? Most people just choose not to learn.

Bryan said:

irinaatcolumbia said:

So, I thought that people who can solve the cube blindfolded would have enhanced spatial memory, and would, therefore, have a larger hippocampus relative to the overall brain size, as compared to individuals who are not able to solve the cube.

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You realize that anyone could solve the cube, right? Most people just choose not to learn.

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I disagree, several people just cannot comprehend even how to get the cross after I helped them for several hours. They just can't see the logical way of the pieces moving. They aren't even stupid, in fact, they get very good grade in all classes at school.

Ok, sorry, that was off topic.

I think this is a great research topic. Do you have an abstract or some sort of plan that we can read? So are you going to scan our heads while we are cubing blindfolded? I suspect the activity of the brain when memorizing is very different from when executing.

You realize that anyone could solve the cube, right? Most people just choose not to learn.

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Perhaps, in the same sense that anybody can choose to become a London taxi driver, and be adequate at it. I would be curious to see whether there's a consensus on this among the others.

It's an interesting assumption, and I think I'll probably have to ignore it. I will have to say that those who can solve the cube blindfolded are unique, and look at the neurological and cognitive effects from that perspective. And while it would be nice to determine whether a neurological property makes somebody excellent at blindfold cubing, or whether the practice necessary to reach that level of dexterity causes the neurological property, that's not something I will (or can) do.

Maybe it would be good to look at those who are extremely skilled at it versus those who are merely adequate, but getting enough subjects would be incredibly difficult.

I'm on the east coast, and would love to participate in a study like this. The only downside is that I live in North Carolina :-( I went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which has a large psychology department. Is there any way you could send the procedure to them, I can participate there, and they can send the data to you? UNC-CH also has a large hospital facility and medical program, so they might have the same machinery that you do, but I'm not certain of this.

If that doesn't work out, then good luck with your research! I agree with some others here that I think anyone is capable to learn how to blindsolve, and that the only difference between highly skilled people and merely adequate people would be practice time and interest level. I have taught kids as young as 2nd and 3rd grade to solve the cube (sighted), and I truly believe that if I had the ability to sit down with each of them for another month that I could have them blindsolving. I guess, try to account for the possibility in your research that you may find no significant difference between highly skilled blindfold cubers and the general population (the only difference being that blindcubers are more motivated to practice blindcubing than the general population). I for one would not be surprised at all if there was no significant difference between blindcubers and the general population.

Chris

irinaatcolumbia said:

I will have to say that those who can solve the cube blindfolded are unique

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I believe that anyone could learn how to do it. I'm quite new to cubing (2 months) and I watched a youtube video for blindfold and I learnt it in less than one day. I'm not special or anything, I just took the time to learn it.

cmhardw said:

I'm on the east coast, and would love to participate in a study like this. The only downside is that I live in North Carolina :-( I went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which has a large psychology department. Is there any way you could send the procedure to them, I can participate there, and they can send the data to you? UNC-CH also has a large hospital facility and medical program, so they might have the same machinery that you do, but I'm not certain of this.

If that doesn't work out, then good luck with your research! I agree with some others here that I think anyone is capable to learn how to blindsolve, and that the only difference between highly skilled people and merely adequate people would be practice time and interest level. I have taught kids as young as 2nd and 3rd grade to solve the cube (sighted), and I truly believe that if I had the ability to sit down with each of them for another month that I could have them blindsolving. I guess, try to account for the possibility in your research that you may find no significant difference between highly skilled blindfold cubers and the general population (the only difference being that blindcubers are more motivated to practice blindcubing than the general population). I for one would not be surprised at all if there was no significant difference between blindcubers and the general population.

Chris

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I'm curious how this will come out too. Chris and I have followed very similar curves in blindfold solving improvement (that is to say, we've been very slow to improve), but we've both gotten kind of good at it. (I'm not as far along the curve as Chris, but the curves look similar.) I am starting to believe that this is because Chris and I are less "talented" than some of the other cubers who have improved much faster (such as Ville, Rafal, and Alex Cook). I have compared number of solves with Joey Gouly, and I am convinced that he was getting sub-minute 3x3x3 BLD solves having made only half the attempts I made in order to get to sub-2 minute solves.

I think a very large percentage of the population has the innate ability to be able to solve a 3x3x3 BLD (much greater than 50%), given the inclination to try. But there does seem to be some difference as to how quickly one can improve. Perhaps that's a difference in the brain, or perhaps that's practice methodology.

Mike Hughey said:

I'm curious how this will come out too. Chris and I have followed very similar curves in blindfold solving improvement (that is to say, we've been very slow to improve), but we've both gotten kind of good at it. (I'm not as far along the curve as Chris, but the curves look similar.) I am starting to believe that this is because Chris and I are less "talented" than some of the other cubers who have improved much faster (such as Ville, Rafal, and Alex Cook).

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Hey Mike,

I have also thought a lot about this. I was also slow to improve at speedsolving the 3x3x3 despite the desire to get faster and despite practicing a lot. I have come to believe though that a lot of my error was in bad practice habits, and bad solving habits. I'm currently still trying to break some of my old bad habits to try to get faster.

As for BLD, I am trying not to succumb to the concept of "talent" or "intelligence" which I am trying hard not to believe in. What I find hard to reconcile with my idea that there is no such thing as "intelligence" is that some people are extremely fast with pure visual memorization, and others like me have a hard time with it. I wonder if that is just how some people have a preference over visual thinking vs. say more database style algorithmic thinking (roman rooms/journeys). I think that if someone wanted to achieve top level blindsolving times, if they found the right memory method for them and practiced a LOT that it could be done.

I do think some people learn faster than others, and this is the only thing I would attribute the name "intelligence" or "talent". So those people can learn faster than others, but I don't think that such a person has more or less capacity for knowledge, they just absorb and learn much quicker than most.

But there does seem to be some difference as to how quickly one can improve. Perhaps that's a difference in the brain, or perhaps that's practice methodology.

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Yeah I definitely agree with this. I wonder if this really is a difference in the brain, or like you say if it is just bad or less than world class practice routines. Or maybe a mix of both?

Chris

Hi Chris and Mike. Thanks for your response, even though it is completely not what I expected to hear.

Every other population that I consider to be extraordinary in some ability would never (ever ever) claim that what they do is not somehow unique. The question of whether distinctive brain physiology causes the ability, or the practice causes the distinctive brain physiology is obviously open.

I am yet to meet a chess or music prodigy who will say "anyone can do what I do if only they try really hard." I am not sure what that means about you guys, but there we have it anyway.

I wonder if that is just how some people have a preference over visual thinking vs. say more database style algorithmic thinking (roman rooms/journeys).

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Yes, most emphatically, yes. At least, according to Howard Gardner, and his theory of multiple intelligence, which is widely accepted by most psychologists, and, less notably, me. One of his intelligences is "visual-spatial," which is the ability to think in terms of physical space. Another one is the "logical-mathematical" intelligence, which is obvious through an individual's capacity for abstraction, and the tendency to experiment and solve puzzles easily.

What an interesting discussion! I used visual memorization for a while for edges in 3x3x3 (back when I was using 3OP to do edges), and it greatly increased my speed. Then I switched to M2, and I didn't bother to try to use visual memorization, because I've always been a little uncomfortable with it anyway (it feels less secure), and because I was able with M2 to get faster times than I ever got with 3OP, even using images.

It is interesting to note that most (but not all) of the really fast people use some sort of pure or near-pure visual method. Of the exceptions, at least two of them I would say use a surprisingly simple memory method: Rafal just uses simple stories, and Tim Habermaas uses a well-practiced but simple system with single images per piece. So it seems as if complex memory methods are not conducive to really fast BLD solving.

irinaatcolumbia, I think the difference here is that when you talk to chess or music prodigies, you're talking to people who have distinguished themselves from a very large population with their achievements. There are many millions who play musical instruments or play chess, and only a very small percentage of them can claim to be prodigies. But with cubing, we still don't have a very large population, and it's all very new, so we don't know how good people can really be yet. I played chess when I was younger, and I still play piano; I was pretty passable at both, but never a prodigy. Still, I felt like the same thing was to some degree true for those - if I had tried REALLY hard, I feel like I could have been perceived as a prodigy too. The problem is that when comparing against a sample of millions of people, trying hard would mean something like practicing piano for 10 hours a day. And clearly most people won't do that. So is "trying really hard" merely a decision, or is it something you have to be born with - a desire to work that hard on it? It makes this sort of thing very hard to study or try to draw any definitive conclusions about.

If you performed what would be a very cruel experiment and locked up a bunch of average young children in rooms with pianos (and occasionally a piano teacher) and told them that in order for them to get their next meal, they must practice to meet their teacher's satisfaction, might you not wind up with a whole bunch of piano prodigies? I think you really might. Of course, it would be unconscionably cruel, but I really suspect it would work.