World-first live experiment examines brain activity, stress, and emotion in elite Go players under r

World-first live experiment examines brain activity, stress, and emotion in elite Go players under real match conditions at University of Jena; explores gender differences in cognitive strain, applies findings to high-stress professions.

What happens in the brain during mental exercise? Likely publishing date: 2026-04-15

What happens in the brain during mental exercise?

Published:15 April 2026, 12:00| By: Sebastian Hollstein

From 18 to 23 April, a very special kind of Sports event will take place at Friedrich Schiller University Jena. Eight players of the Asian board game Go will compete against each other in a total of twelve games—including representatives of the European Go elite. The speciality: The opponents are not playing for a title, but on behalf of science.

The games are part of a globally unique experiment in which psychologists from the University of Jena will look directly into the players’ brains during the matches and measure how much physiological stress the mental sport causes. They also want to find out whether men and women deal with the cognitive strain differently. Interested parties can follow the matches—including brain activity—live on site and on the internet. Go experts from the European Go Federation and researchers from the field of Psychology will comment on what is happening on the board and in the mind.

»In high-performance sport, people push themselves to their limits, move at their stress threshold and at times draw on their last reserves of energy. This applies to both the marathon runner and the mental athlete«, says clinical psychologist Prof Dr Ilona Croy from the University of Jena. »With our experiment, we want to find out what exactly happens in our brain during cognitively challenging situations.«

How a gaming error manifests itself in the brain

The best way to visualise this is through the oxygen consumption of the brain. In addition to sensors to record the heart rate and muscle tone in the shoulder area, the Go players are therefore fitted with electrodes on their heads during the games. Using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), the researchers observe how the blood flow in the brain changes and which regions of the brain are supplied with more blood and oxygen in certain game situations.

This allows them to understand what happens in our thinking centre during a game mistake, for example. »In every game of Go, there are turning points caused by mistakes, in which the balance of dominance on the board changes«, explains Ilona Croy. »If a player makes a mistake and gets angry about it, this can also be seen in the brain.« Regions that are responsible for emotions then consume more oxygen. When the anger subsides, more oxygen-rich blood flows back into the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the brain’s thinking and planning centre.

World champion initiates the experiment and takes part herself

The opponents play their games on electronic boards - the action is digitally transmitted live and analysed by artificial intelligence. »Although we are able to reproduce the course of the game and the measured values in a very well synchronised manner in this way, this does not mean that we can immediately observe the brain’s reaction after a mistake. This is because players do not always realise immediately that they have made a mistake. That’s why we ask the players separately after the encounter how they perceived the game and thus build a bridge between the immediate AI evaluation and the human perspective, i.e. the measured values«, explains the initiator of the study, Prof Dr Manja Marz from the University of Jena.

The bioinformatician from the University of Jena has a keen interest in the research results herself, as she is one of the best Go players in the world. Just a few weeks ago, she won the amateur world championship title in Tokyo. She will also be sitting at the board during the experiment. »So I might find out how long I should take to make the next move after a mistake until the rational centre of my brain has taken control again.«

Differences between player and player

The two researchers are focussing in particular on possible gender-specific differences. As part of the »Gender in Focus« project at the University of Jena, the pilot study is the first to investigate whether men and women show different neuronal activation patterns and compensation strategies during long-term peak mental performance. This is why women and men play against each other separately during the experiment.

»In both Go and chess, for example, there has been a long debate about why women do not play as well as men«, explains Manja Marz. »The most prominent reason is that it is a statistical effect because there are simply far fewer female players than male players. But perhaps the brains of men and women also function differently in evolutionary terms. It is discussed that men might be more confrontational and try to stake out territory, while women are more concerned with harmony and focus on making things fit together harmoniously. This may lead to different playing styles in Go.« During their experiments, the Jena team now wants to find out whether men or women are better or worse at drawing on reserves in the brain and whether they recover more quickly from cognitive stress, for example.

The Go experiment, which has never before been conducted in this form anywhere in the world, is likely to attract great interest not only in the (subject) areas|field of thinking and e-sports. The research results also provide valuable information for occupational groups that work in a highly concentrated manner over a long period of time, such as pilots or surgeons. Gender-specific findings may provide impetus for gender-sensitive performance promotion in subject) areas|fields with high mental stress.

The Go-Experiment will take place from 18 to 23 April at the University of Jena. Interested parties can follow the encounters live on site at Inselplatz 5, room 4012, between 9.30 am and 3 pm. There they will also meet experts who will introduce them to Go. The event will also be broadcast live and with commentary on the European Go Federation’s Twitch channel:https:

Manja Marz, University Professor Dr

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