Attention Games
Potion Master Demo
The Science Behind Potion Master
How Does This Game Train Your Brain?
Potion Master blends memory encoding, response speed, selective attention, and executive control as players learn, retain, and reconstruct changing ingredient sets under pressure.
Brain Regions & Cognitive Functions
Prefrontal Cortex
The game primarily targets the prefrontal cortex, responsible for executive functions including:
- Working Memory Updating: You have to encode ingredient sets quickly, hold them briefly, and reconstruct them accurately as each potion changes.
- Inhibitory Control: Distractor ingredients force players to suppress impulsive selections and respond only when they are confident in the remembered recipe.
Anterior Cingulate Cortex
This region is engaged during conflict monitoring and error detection.
- Selective Attention: Players must keep relevant ingredients in focus while filtering out plausible but incorrect alternatives during the choice phase.
- Error Monitoring: Missed ingredients and false selections create fast feedback loops that encourage checking memory before acting.
Striatum & Basal Ganglia
These structures are central to reward processing and motor control.
- Reward Processing: Completing recipes correctly reinforces deliberate recall and helps sustain engagement across increasingly demanding rounds.
- Response Speed: Time-limited ingredient recall turns memory performance into a paced decision task rather than a passive recognition exercise.
Research-Informed Practice Design
Cognitive Practice
The practice skills in the game are inspired by established cognitive task concepts:
Reaction Time
Based on standard reaction time paradigms used to assess processing speed and attentional alerting (Posner, 1980).
Selective Attention
Derived from tasks like the Flanker Task and Stroop Test that measure interference control (Eriksen & Eriksen, 1974; MacLeod, 1991).
Inhibition Control
Inspired by Go/No-Go and Stop Signal tasks, which measure response inhibition (Logan et al., 1984).
Mental Flexibility
Reflects set-shifting abilities measured by tasks like the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and Trail Making Test B (Berg, 1948; Reitan, 1958).
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