Chess and Brains

Several enthusiastic historical practitioners of chess have espoused their beliefs that the skills associated with chess can be extrapolated to external scenarios. One of the first documented cases of an intellectual asserting that connections exist between chess proficiency and other skills is Benjamin Franklin’s 1750 essay The Morales of Chess. In this essay, Franklin hypothesized that “The game of Chess is not merely an idle amusement. Several very valuable qualities of the mind, useful in the course of human life, are to be acquired or strengthened by it, so as to become habits, ready on all occasions.” He then enumerated these specific qualities, listing them as “1. Foresight… 2. Circumspection… 3. Caution… [and] lastly… the habit of not being discouraged by present bad appearances in the state of our affairs.”

Franklin’s foundation of enumerating the skills cultivated by playing chess eventually became the groundwork for several academic studies conducted in the 20th and 21st centuries. These studies, in turn, have helped parents and school administrators across the world to justify teaching young children chess, in the hopes of simultaneously improving their cognitive capabilities. Chess education is a mandatory component of elementary school in Armenia, and local school districts across United States, Russia, and other nations, have chosen to incorporate chess into their curricula in order to stimulate the cognitive skills of children (Milat, 1997).

Many studies have been done associating study of chess with heightened intellectual prowess in school aged children (Ferguson, 1995). Dr. Robert Ferguson, a researcher with a keen interest in the effects of chess on cognitive development, compiled and discussed a list of supporting studies in his 1995 research summary Chess in Education. Ferguson discussed numerous studies, conducted in multiple different nations, during the timeframe 1974 to 1995. Each study reinforced initial hypotheses that playing chess can potentially contribute to improved cognitive capabilities outside of the game.

The first of the studies discussed by Ferguson took place in Zaire during the mid 1970s. Approximately 100 students, aged 16-18, were randomly selected to either be a part of the treatment or the control group. The treatment group received two hours of weekly chess instruction over the course of an academic year, while the control group instead was exposed to two hours of additional schooling in the default curriculum. Both groups took exams designed to measure problem solving, verbal, and mathematical skills, both at the beginning of the year and at the end of the year (Ferguson, 1995).

Despite having pretest scores similar to those earned by students in the control group, students in the treatment group ended up scoring markedly higher than their control group counterparts on the posttest analysis. This increase in scores was shown to be statistically significant across the entire treatment group, and was not just limited to the more skilled chess players. Researchers used this information to conclude that receiving the one year of chess instruction led to improved verbal and mathematical aptitudes in test subjects (Ferguson, 1995). The conclusion that chess proficiency is positively correlated with cognitive development led to the researchers making the normative claim that “the introduction of chess as a regular elective course [in schools] would be of positive benefit.”

The results of the Zaire experiment have been supported by the results of a myriad other trials by other researchers. In an experiment conducted in Belgium from 1974-1976, researcher Johan Christiaen concluded that the inclusion of chess lessons in an elementary school classroom facilitated “earlier intellectual maturation” as defined the experimenters and measured by standardized examinations (Christiaen, 1977). From 1979-1983, Ferguson conducted a study in which a treatment group of randomly selected elementary school children received regular chess instruction in their classrooms. The results of his study supported his initial hypothesis, and led to the conclusion that receiving chess instruction generally leads to statistically significant improvements in both the raw test scores and percentile rankings of students (Ferguson, 1995).

In 2001, Jim Celone conducted a research study in which a small, self-selected, group of elementary school children received chess instruction over the course of eight weeks. The study aimed to determine if a correlation exists between chess proficiency and the ability for children to solve logical thinking problems both related and unrelated to chess. A comparison of pretest and posttest results indicated that receiving regular chess instruction led students to be more adept at solving logical thinking problems in both categories. Students scored significantly higher on the posttest chess puzzles than they had on similar pretest chess puzzles, and also made improvements from pretest to posttest on an examination of logic puzzles that were not based around chess (Celone, 2001).

In addition to these various studies, which have documented a positive correlation between chess proficiency and scores on standardized examinations, several studies have associated chess playing with improvement in other cognitive traits, such as memory, creativity, critical thinking, and originality (Ferguson, 1995). While many studies have demonstrated that chess can be effectively used as a tool to facilitate improvement on standardized examinations, admittedly fewer studies have examined the correlation between chess proficiency and otherwise unrelated intellectual pursuits.

One study, conducted by Philip Rifner from 1991-1992, aimed to determine whether or not students who practiced general problem solving skills through playing chess could successfully apply those skills to an unrelated domain, in this case, poetic analysis. The study concluded that chess proficiency develops skills which students can indeed apply to other fields. Students were shown to be more adept at poetic analysis as a result of exposure to chess, leading to the conclusion that chess potentially accelerates cognitive development in a multitude of capacities (Rifner, 1992).

Due to the widespread acknowledgement of the intellectual benefits associated with playing chess, initiatives have been undertaken across the globe to incorporate the game into school curricula. In the United States, the initiative has been spearheaded by the American Chess Foundation (ACF) and the United States Chess Federation (USCF) (Milat, 1997). One specific initiative, based in New Jersey, officially sanctioned the use of chess as an educational tool in elementary schools, declaring that “instruction in chess during the second grade will enable pupils to learn skills which will serve them throughout their lives.” Similar efforts to incorporate chess into school curricula have taken place in nations as diverse as Russia, Venezuela, and Armenia. The legislative bodies responsible for these initiatives have officially stated their beliefs that learning chess helps students develop cognitive skills which are directly applicable to their external lives.

Unfortunately, research into skills enhanced by chess proficiency typically focuses on case studies of elementary school, middle school, and high school aged children. There is a glaring lack of research into the impacts of chess proficiency on the capabilities of adults to succeed in external endeavors. President Truman famously compared international politics to a game of chess, referencing inherent similarities between the two subject matters, specifically the need for strategic decision making in a competitive environment (Truman, 1947). Because studies have shown that children have the capacity to apply skills honed by chess proficiency to external domains, it is not entirely unreasonable to hypothesize that adults who regularly play chess will also be able to apply techniques of strategic decision making to their personal endeavors, giving them a competitive edge over those adults who do not play chess (Rifner, 1992, Van Zyl, 1991).

Celone, J. (2001). The effects of a chess program on abstract reasoning and problem-solving in elementary school children. Southern Connecticut State University). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, , 42-42 p. Retrieved http://search.proquest.com/docview/250187240?accountid=15053. (250187240).

Van Zyl, Anna Sophia,Aletta Johanna. (1991). The significance of playing chess in improving a child’s intellectual actualisation. (afrikaans text); University of Pretoria (South Africa)). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, , 0-1. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/303963721?accountid=15053. (303963721).

Pearson, T. R. (2009). The effects of learning to play chess on the nonverbal reasoning abilities of grade 5 students. Nipissing University (Canada)). ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, , 150. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/305060144?accountid=15053. (305060144).