Cryptic puzzles are a lot more mathematical than you might have thought
Good news, everyone: it’s New Research Time!
There’s an article in the open-access journal Frontiers about the solvers of cryptic crosswords. It’s by Kathryn Friedlander and Philip Fine of the University of Buckingham and it’s titled The Grounded Expertise Components Approach in the Novel Area of Cryptic Crossword Solving.
... cryptic crossword skill therefore appears to be bound up with code-cracking and problem-solving skills of a quasi-algebraic nature. Conversely, lexical ability, although no doubt valuable, does not appear to be a critical discriminator of high expertise among elite solvers.
Interestingly, playing Scrabble and solving non-cryptic crosswords were comparatively unpopular hobbies.
Continue reading...