A word appears. Have you seen it already in this run, or is it new? The list keeps growing.
Most runs end around 25
One word appears at a time, drawn from a bank of 282. Answer SEEN if that word has already come up during this run, or NEW if it has not. Every word you are shown joins the list, so what you are holding in your head keeps getting longer. Three wrong answers end the run.
This is recognition memory rather than recall — you are not asked to produce anything, only to know whether you have met a word before. Most runs end somewhere between 15 and 30. People who do well tend to describe trusting a feeling of familiarity rather than searching a list, which is both faster and, oddly, more accurate.
A word appears. Say SEEN if it has already come up in this run, or NEW if it has not. Every word you are shown joins the list, so the list you are holding in your head keeps growing.
Most runs end somewhere between 15 and 30. Fifty is sharp, and getting near a hundred is genuinely rare.
Number memory asks you to recall something exactly. This asks you to recognise it, which is a different and much longer-lasting kind of memory — and the difficulty comes from the list growing, not the words getting harder.
Do not try to hold a list. Most people who do well say they get a feeling of familiarity from a word and trust it, which is faster and more reliable than searching your memory each time.
More to play: Number Memory Test, Visual Memory Test, or all solo games.