About the image picture. Figure 1 shows an example of Kim’s Game. There are 18 gem stones in the example. The concept is to remember this list of stones when they are displayed. After a minute, the gem stones will be covered and participants are asked to remember as many as they can of the list. [1]
How Did Kim’s Game Come About?
Kim’s Game was introduced by Robert Baden Powell, founder of the Scouting Movement, as a memory training exercise. He got the idea from his good friend Rudyard Kipling’s novel Kim. In the story, Kim, a teenager, was being trained as a spy. He spent a month in Simla, British India at the home of a Mr Lurgan, who outwardly runs a jewel shop, but in truth was spying for the British against the Russians.
Mr Lurgan trained Kim to remember the gems on a tray — to count them and to remember the details so that when the gems are covered, he could still remember them to make a list of the stones on the tray. He taught him to play the game many times, at times with jewels, at times with odd objects, and sometimes with photographs of people. These exercises were a vital part of training in observing details. His advice to Kim was to “do it many times over till it is done perfectly — for it is worth doing”. [1]
Kim’s Game in Scouting
In his book Scouting Games Robert Baden Powell described how Kim’s Game is to be played:
“The Scoutmaster should collect on a tray a number of articles — knives, spoons, pencil, pen, stones, book and so on — not more than about fifteen for the first few games, and cover the whole over with a cloth. He than makes the others sit around, where they can see the tray, and uncovers it for one minute. Then each of them must make a list on a piece of paper of all the articles he can remember … The one who remembers most wins the game.”
Kim’s Game in Military Use
The Kim’s Game is used as a memory test in Royal Marines commando training and Royal Marines sniper training. [1]
How to Master Kim’s Game
Figure 2 shows the steps to master Kim’s Game.
Does Playing cards/Mahjong Reduce Dementia Risk?
The answer is yes, if one plays cards/mahjong almost every day. A study of onset of dementia in 821 older Chinese adults diagnosed with dementia during a 10-year follow-up showed that compared to participants who rarely play cards/mahjong, those who do so almost every day had a reduced risk of dementia (Hazard risk = 0.63).[3] Thus people who play cards/mahjong almost every day had a 63% chance of getting dementia compared to those who rarely do so, a reduction of 37% risk.
Take Home Messages
In dementia prevention, memory training is important. The principles of Kim’s Game are applied. With practice, the ability to remember things will be enhanced. For those who play cards/mahjong almost every day have 37% risk reduction of dementia onset.
References
1-Kim’s Game. Wikipedia, 28 Mar 2023 https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5e/Gem.pebbles.800pix.jpg/330px-Gem.pebbles.800pix.jpg
2-Kim’s Game. Scout Wiki 17 JU 2020 https://scoutwiki.scouts.org.za/wiki/Kim%27s_Game
3-Gang Tian, Jingliang Shuai, Rui Li et al. Association between playing cards/mahjong and risk of incident dementia among Chinese older adults: a prospective cohort study. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36072484/
Acknowledgments
Thanks are due to Wikipedia for the use of the two illustrations in this post.
Dr LG Goh
Dr GOH Lee Gan is a retired Associate Professor in the Department of Family Medicine, National University Health System. He has an interest in learning and teaching how we can age well everyday (AWE).
