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Brain exercise

Remembering Where, Not What

Squares light up one at a time. Tap them back in the same order, and notice that this feels nothing like remembering a phone number.

The sequence gets one longer each round until it slips.

This is a demonstration of an effect, not the clinical task it resembles. It uses different stimuli, has no normed scoring and no cut-offs, and no result here is interpreted. Clinical versions of tasks like this are administered under controlled conditions for good reasons.

What just happened

Two different stores, not one memory

  • You could not say it to yourselfVerbal material gets rehearsed as sound. A path across a grid does not convert into words easily, so the usual strategy is unavailable.
  • So you held a shape insteadMost people report holding a route or a picture rather than a list. That is a different store with a different capacity.
  • It slipped all at onceLike the rhythm task, the failure is abrupt rather than gradual. That is characteristic of working memory rather than a sign of anything.
Diagram from Chicago Brain Health contrasting verbal short-term memory, rehearsed as sound, with spatial memory, held as a route or a shape, showing they are two separate stores.
Why this feels nothing like remembering a phone number

Verbal and spatial working memory are separable enough that you can load one heavily while leaving the other largely free. That is why you can follow directions while listening to someone talk, but not while reading a map.

A quick note. Reaching four or five is an ordinary result. This version has no norms and is not built to measure anyone.

Square illustration from Chicago Brain Health of a four by four grid with a path stepping through six squares that fade as the sequence goes on, representing a spatial span task.
A route through a grid, fading as it lengthens

Science vs hype

What this does not mean

What you may have seen. Grid-and-sequence games sold as memory training that will help with everyday forgetfulness or protect against decline.

What this activity actually involves. A spatial sequence demonstration on a nine cell grid. It reports how many rounds you reached and nothing else.

Where the evidence stops. People improve at sequence tasks with practice. Evidence that this transfers to everyday memory is weak and heavily contested, and evidence that it protects against cognitive decline is weaker still. A run here measures nothing and is not a screening tool.

Someone paused in a doorway having forgotten why they came into the room
Why did I come in here

Who Can Use This One

  • Vision is required and so is the ability to point or tab to a cell.
  • No time limit on your reply.
  • Keyboard operable, every cell is a real button with a visible focus ring.
  • Nothing is recorded. No account, no score stored, nothing sent anywhere.

Memory Is Not One Thing

You just felt two kinds of memory behave differently, which is something most people are never shown.

It matters because “my memory is getting worse” is far too broad to act on. A proper evaluation separates verbal from spatial, immediate from delayed, recognition from recall, because those patterns point at different causes and different answers. Some of those causes are very treatable.

That conversation is free if the broad version of that worry has been sitting with you.

If you would rather read first, our conditions page sets out what neurofeedback is used for and how strong the evidence is for each, and our research page covers what the studies actually found, including the ones that came out negative.

Let’s chat

A free conversation with a psychologist. No intake form, no obligation, and we will tell you plainly when the answer is that you do not need us.

These activities are demonstrations of how perception, attention, memory and movement work. They are not tests, screenings or diagnostic tools, and no result here says anything about whether you have a medical or psychological condition. Nothing on this page is medical advice or a substitute for evaluation by a qualified professional. Last reviewed September 2026.