The popularity of brain exercises from Japan began in 2005 with Nintendo's Brain Age game and puzzles such as Sudoku. Many baby boomers and older adults began playing these games and working the puzzles to improve memory, increase IQ and to make the brain more active. Japan's educators and scientists have devised a large number of brain exercises and games designed to increase brain functioning for children, adults and the elderly.
Brain Age
Noting the aging population in Japan, Japanese scientist of Dr. Ryuta Kawashima of Tohoku University of Medicine, decided he needed to do something about the mental agility of elderly citizens in Japan. Once an opponent to video games, Kawashima studied video games and decided that video games could be used to increase mental reasoning and language. Kawashima's research brought about the Nintendo game, Brain Age. Brain Age has components that test and increase math skills, memory skills, and reading aloud skills that increase neural pathways. All of the skills are graphed and saved so the user can see progress or regression.
Sudoku
Suduko is a Japanese puzzle that exercises the reasoning and analytic side of the brain. Suduko was popularized by the Nikoli Puzzle Company in 1986 and gained worldwide popularity in 2005. Suduko is a modern puzzle derived from the old magic square puzzles from the 1800's. Suduko puzzles are made up of a 9 x 9 square grid in which each row contains the numbers 1 through 9. At the beginning of the game, some numbers in each square are given, and the player, through the use of logic, reasons out the other numbers. There are many variations of suduko, such as a suduko for children that uses a smaller grid and has symbols such as planets and animals instead of numbers.
Anzan
Anzan reaches deep in Japanese history for the origin of this brain exercise. Anzan translated to English means "mental calculation" and involves mentally calculating long strings of numbers by imagining an abacus. The abacus was introduced to Japan in the 1500's through China. Abacii have a series of beads that represents number groups and have been used historically by the Japanese as manual calculators. In anzan the abacus is pictured in the mind and the addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and bookkeeping is completed through deep concentration and mental manipulation of the abacus. To become proficient at anzan requires hours of practice and many Japanese children practice anzan exercises 2 hours a day.
