Digit span
Joseph Jacobs
How many digits, letters or words a person can repeat straight back. Jacobs reported the first memory span task on record.
Practice versionDigit SpanHear digits one a second, then say them back, forward or reversed.Collection
Classic cognitive tasks
Tasks from more than a century of research on attention, memory, perception, language and planning, rebuilt as free practice versions for any screen. Each has presets and a large-print mode, and its results are plain counts and times.
10 tasks1887 to 1971Free to practice
1887
1890s
Cancellation
Benjamin Bourdon
Crossing out every target on a page of look-alikes, one of the oldest attention tasks in psychology.
Practice versionVisual SearchFind and mark every target hidden among the distractors.1911
Digit symbol substitution
Robert Woodworth and Frederic Wells
Pairing symbols and numbers from a key as quickly as possible. A version was given to US Army recruits in the First World War.
Practice versionSymbol MatchTap the number that matches each symbol, against the key.1917
Overlapping figures
Studies of soldiers with head injuries
Outlines drawn on top of one another, first used to understand how people with head injuries from the First World War recognized shapes.
Practice versionFigure & GroundPick target shapes out of overlapping outlines, or count every shape.1920
Kohs block design
Samuel C. Kohs
Two-color cubes turned and set side by side to copy a printed pattern, a task that needs no words at all.
Practice versionBlock DesignCopy a two-color block pattern on the screen or with real blocks.1931
Gestalt completion
Roy F. Street
Recognizing an object from a picture with parts missing, as the eye fills in the gaps.
Practice versionVisual ClosureWork out what the missing part is and pick the complete picture.1935
Stroop color and word
John Ridley Stroop
Naming the ink color of a word that spells a different color, the best-known picture of attention pulled two ways.
Practice versionStroopTap the ink color, not the word, as fast as you can.1936
Matrix puzzles
Lionel Penrose and John Raven
A grid of pictures with one missing, built so the rule can be found without words. In Pattern Recognition, choose Rule boxes.
Practice versionPattern RecognitionWork out the rule and pick what comes next.1938
Trail making
John Partington
Joining numbered circles in order, then numbers and letters in turn. The US Army gave it the name Trail Making in 1944.
Practice versionTrail MakingConnect numbered circles in order, or alternate numbers and letters, timed.1971
Mental rotation
Roger Shepard and Jacqueline Metzler
Deciding whether two turned block figures are the same shape, the study that showed people turn pictures in their minds.
Practice versionMental RotationJudge whether a figure has been turned or mirrored, timed.
Nothing about the people who practice is stored.