Skip to main content
  • Submit
  • About
    • Editorial Board
    • PNAS Staff
    • FAQ
    • Accessibility Statement
    • Rights and Permissions
    • Site Map
  • Contact
  • Journal Club
  • Subscribe
    • Subscription Rates
    • Subscriptions FAQ
    • Open Access
    • Recommend PNAS to Your Librarian
  • Log in
  • My Cart

Main menu

  • Home
  • Articles
    • Current
    • Special Feature Articles - Most Recent
    • Special Features
    • Colloquia
    • Collected Articles
    • PNAS Classics
    • List of Issues
  • Front Matter
  • News
    • For the Press
    • This Week In PNAS
    • PNAS in the News
  • Podcasts
  • Authors
    • Information for Authors
    • Editorial and Journal Policies
    • Submission Procedures
    • Fees and Licenses
  • Submit
  • About
    • Editorial Board
    • PNAS Staff
    • FAQ
    • Accessibility Statement
    • Rights and Permissions
    • Site Map
  • Contact
  • Journal Club
  • Subscribe
    • Subscription Rates
    • Subscriptions FAQ
    • Open Access
    • Recommend PNAS to Your Librarian

User menu

  • Log in
  • My Cart

Search

  • Advanced search
Home
Home

Advanced Search

  • Home
  • Articles
    • Current
    • Special Feature Articles - Most Recent
    • Special Features
    • Colloquia
    • Collected Articles
    • PNAS Classics
    • List of Issues
  • Front Matter
  • News
    • For the Press
    • This Week In PNAS
    • PNAS in the News
  • Podcasts
  • Authors
    • Information for Authors
    • Editorial and Journal Policies
    • Submission Procedures
    • Fees and Licenses

New Research In

Physical Sciences

Featured Portals

  • Physics
  • Chemistry
  • Sustainability Science

Articles by Topic

  • Applied Mathematics
  • Applied Physical Sciences
  • Astronomy
  • Computer Sciences
  • Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
  • Engineering
  • Environmental Sciences
  • Mathematics
  • Statistics

Social Sciences

Featured Portals

  • Anthropology
  • Sustainability Science

Articles by Topic

  • Economic Sciences
  • Environmental Sciences
  • Political Sciences
  • Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
  • Social Sciences

Biological Sciences

Featured Portals

  • Sustainability Science

Articles by Topic

  • Agricultural Sciences
  • Anthropology
  • Applied Biological Sciences
  • Biochemistry
  • Biophysics and Computational Biology
  • Cell Biology
  • Developmental Biology
  • Ecology
  • Environmental Sciences
  • Evolution
  • Genetics
  • Immunology and Inflammation
  • Medical Sciences
  • Microbiology
  • Neuroscience
  • Pharmacology
  • Physiology
  • Plant Biology
  • Population Biology
  • Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
  • Sustainability Science
  • Systems Biology
Research Article

Improving fluid intelligence with training on working memory

Susanne M. Jaeggi, Martin Buschkuehl, John Jonides, and Walter J. Perrig
PNAS May 13, 2008 105 (19) 6829-6833; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0801268105
Susanne M. Jaeggi
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
  • For correspondence: sjaeggi@umich.edu mbu@umich.edu
Martin Buschkuehl
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
  • For correspondence: sjaeggi@umich.edu mbu@umich.edu
John Jonides
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
Walter J. Perrig
  • Find this author on Google Scholar
  • Find this author on PubMed
  • Search for this author on this site
  1. Edited by Edward E. Smith, Columbia University, New York, NY, and approved March 18, 2008 (received for review February 7, 2008)

Related Articles

  • Increasing fluid intelligence is possible after all
    - May 12, 2008
  • In This Issue
    - May 13, 2008
  • Article
  • Figures & SI
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF
Loading

Abstract

Fluid intelligence (Gf) refers to the ability to reason and to solve new problems independently of previously acquired knowledge. Gf is critical for a wide variety of cognitive tasks, and it is considered one of the most important factors in learning. Moreover, Gf is closely related to professional and educational success, especially in complex and demanding environments. Although performance on tests of Gf can be improved through direct practice on the tests themselves, there is no evidence that training on any other regimen yields increased Gf in adults. Furthermore, there is a long history of research into cognitive training showing that, although performance on trained tasks can increase dramatically, transfer of this learning to other tasks remains poor. Here, we present evidence for transfer from training on a demanding working memory task to measures of Gf. This transfer results even though the trained task is entirely different from the intelligence test itself. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the extent of gain in intelligence critically depends on the amount of training: the more training, the more improvement in Gf. That is, the training effect is dosage-dependent. Thus, in contrast to many previous studies, we conclude that it is possible to improve Gf without practicing the testing tasks themselves, opening a wide range of applications.

  • cognitive training
  • transfer
  • individual differences
  • executive processes
  • control processes

Footnotes

  • ‡To whom correspondence may be addressed. E-mail: sjaeggi{at}umich.edu or mbu{at}umich.edu
  • Author contributions: S.M.J. and M.B. contributed equally to this work; and S.M.J., M.B., J.J., and W.J.P. wrote the paper.

  • The authors declare no conflict of interest.

  • See Commentary on page 6791.

  • This article is a PNAS Direct Submission.

  • ↵§ Note that the specific training gain was well explained by a linear function for all groups (8 days training: R2 = 0.78, F(1,134) = 473.44, P < 0.001; 12 days training: R2 = 0.81, F(1,202) = 863.59, P < 0.001; 17 days training: R2 = 0.73, F(1,287) = 769.63; 19 days training: R2 = 0.79, F(1,321) = 1230.23, P < 0.001).

  • ↵¶ Although this procedure differs from the standardized procedure, there is evidence that this timed procedure has little influence on relative standings in these tests, in that the correlation of speeded and non-speeded versions is very high (r = 0.95; ref. 37).

  • © 2008 by The National Academy of Sciences of the USA
View Full Text
PreviousNext
Back to top
Article Alerts
Email Article

Thank you for your interest in spreading the word on PNAS.

NOTE: We only request your email address so that the person you are recommending the page to knows that you wanted them to see it, and that it is not junk mail. We do not capture any email address.

Enter multiple addresses on separate lines or separate them with commas.
Improving fluid intelligence with training on working memory
(Your Name) has sent you a message from PNAS
(Your Name) thought you would like to see the PNAS web site.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
Citation Tools
Improving fluid intelligence with training on working memory
Susanne M. Jaeggi, Martin Buschkuehl, John Jonides, Walter J. Perrig
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 2008, 105 (19) 6829-6833; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0801268105

Citation Manager Formats

  • BibTeX
  • Bookends
  • EasyBib
  • EndNote (tagged)
  • EndNote 8 (xml)
  • Medlars
  • Mendeley
  • Papers
  • RefWorks Tagged
  • Ref Manager
  • RIS
  • Zotero
Request Permissions
Share
Improving fluid intelligence with training on working memory
Susanne M. Jaeggi, Martin Buschkuehl, John Jonides, Walter J. Perrig
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 2008, 105 (19) 6829-6833; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0801268105
Digg logo Reddit logo Twitter logo Facebook logo Google logo Mendeley logo
  • Tweet Widget
  • Facebook Like
  • Mendeley logo Mendeley
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: 105 (19)
Table of Contents

Submit

Sign up for Article Alerts

Jump to section

  • Article
    • Abstract
    • Results
    • Discussion
    • Materials and Methods
    • Acknowledgments
    • Footnotes
    • References
  • Figures & SI
  • Info & Metrics
  • PDF

You May Also be Interested in

Abstract depiction of a guitar and musical note
Science & Culture: At the nexus of music and medicine, some see disease treatments
Although the evidence is still limited, a growing body of research suggests music may have beneficial effects for diseases such as Parkinson’s.
Image credit: Shutterstock/agsandrew.
Large piece of gold
News Feature: Tracing gold's cosmic origins
Astronomers thought they’d finally figured out where gold and other heavy elements in the universe came from. In light of recent results, they’re not so sure.
Image credit: Science Source/Tom McHugh.
Dancers in red dresses
Journal Club: Friends appear to share patterns of brain activity
Researchers are still trying to understand what causes this strong correlation between neural and social networks.
Image credit: Shutterstock/Yeongsik Im.
Yellow emoticons
Learning the language of facial expressions
Aleix Martinez explains why facial expressions often are not accurate indicators of emotion.
Listen
Past PodcastsSubscribe
Goats standing in a pin
Transplantation of sperm-producing stem cells
CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing can improve the effectiveness of spermatogonial stem cell transplantation in mice and livestock, a study finds.
Image credit: Jon M. Oatley.

Similar Articles

Site Logo
Powered by HighWire
  • Submit Manuscript
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • RSS Feeds
  • Email Alerts

Articles

  • Current Issue
  • Special Feature Articles – Most Recent
  • List of Issues

PNAS Portals

  • Anthropology
  • Chemistry
  • Classics
  • Front Matter
  • Physics
  • Sustainability Science
  • Teaching Resources

Information

  • Authors
  • Editorial Board
  • Reviewers
  • Librarians
  • Press
  • Site Map
  • PNAS Updates

Feedback    Privacy/Legal

Copyright © 2021 National Academy of Sciences. Online ISSN 1091-6490