At first glance, quietly solving sudoku puzzles and socializing at parties have absolutely nothing in common. And yet both of these activities turn out to be equally beneficial for the brain. How come?

Check out: A Social Brain Is a Smarter Brain

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 Glossary

• randomly – lacking any definite plan or prearranged order
• probe –  question closely
• prelude – any action, event, comment, etc. that precedes something else
• take a crack at something  – to try to do something; have a go at doing something 
• underscore  – to stress; emphasize
• outweigh  – to exceed in value, importance, influence
• causality – the relation of cause and effect

Think about it

Answer the questions below.

• What are the results of the study led by researchers at the University of Michigan?
• Describe the way the study was conducted. What conclusions did the researchers reach?
• What other two studies were conducted?
• What was the GE/NFL Head Health Open Innovation Challenge? 
• What did the study published in Nature Neuroscience show?

Practice makes perfect

Fill in the blank spaces with the missing words. Use ONE word per blank space.

Two other recent studies underscore how deeply social ________ activity open innovation is.  ________ first, from Newcastle Business School in ________ UK, looks directly at knowledge exchange between higher education institutions and industry (a typical exchange in open innovation challenges) and concludes that ________ success depends ________ the social processes that facilitate the collaboration. The ________, from the University of Lapland in Finland, explores what executives who sponsor open innovation challenges value most ________ them, and finds that the broader benefits of the multidisciplinary social interaction outweigh the concrete results ________ getting specific solutions.

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