A computer game created by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, to practice musical rhythm unexpectedly improved the memory of older participants, PNAS reported.

Forty-seven people between the ages of 60 and 79 participated in the experiment. One group played the musical rhythm game "Rhythmicity," and the other group played word searches. The 20-minute game sessions were played by participants five days a week for eight weeks.

"Rhythmicity" was developed with drummer Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead. It used visual cues to teach participants how to play rhythm on a tablet. The required tempo, difficulty, and accuracy were adjusted to the players' scores.

Interestingly, learning musical rhythm proved to be able to improve performance on a non-musical task. The analysis was conducted using electroencephalography (EEG) during the task of remembering the faces of people unknown to the participants. Those who played Rhythmicity became better at recognizing faces after eight weeks, and EEG data showed increased activity in the upper parietal lobe, an area of the brain associated with short-term visual memory.