Puzzles for a digital wellbeing routine at home

On the kitchen table sit a paper 15x15 crossword and a pencil, with a solver seated in front of them. The phone is face down on the far side of the table, so the solver cannot reach it without standing up. The session begins when the kettle clicks off at seven, and a small timer on the counter is set for thirty minutes.

A routine here means a fixed start time, a fixed length and a clear stop. Each evening the solver does not have to decide whether to play or how long to play. When the timer rings, the grid goes away even if a corner is still empty, and the pencil stays beside it for tomorrow.

Many plans to cut screen time count every minute on a device as the same kind of minute. Many people assume there is more evidence for that than there is. A 2019 review in Psychological Science by Amy Orben and Andrew Przybylski used three nationally representative time-use-diary datasets and found little clear-cut evidence that screen time decreases well-being among 14- to 17-year-olds. The review looked at screen time in general, not at puzzles, so it says nothing about any one grid or app.

Counting time by activity

Minutes can be counted by activity rather than by device. If the grid is printed or shown on a tablet, thirty minutes with a crossword is logged as thirty minutes of crossword under that method. Instead of one block of screen minutes, the daily total is a list of things done, such as cooking, a phone call and a puzzle.

A paper crossword has a natural end. The first one appeared in the New York World on December 21, 1913, made by Arthur Wynne, and the form has kept the same finish since: the session is over when the grid is full. American-style daily grids are usually 15x15, so a solver can time one grid from the first letter to the last and write the number on the margin. After few grids, that written time gives a fair idea of how long a session will run.

Scrolling works differently. A feed has no last square, and new items keep arriving, so the stop has to come from outside, such as an alarm or a decision to put the phone down. With a grid in front of them, a solver can see how much is left and judge whether it fits before the timer rings.

Where a puzzle session fits in the day

A solver who plays after lunch chooses that time and keeps to it. The plates are cleared and the phone goes on the shelf before the board comes out at 1:00. Once the time is chosen, the day does not need a new decision about when to play. Lunch places the session at a fixed point in the day, with something before it and something after it.

The same solver also keeps to one board size. A 6x6 grid is small enough to finish in a short break, and a session on it can be timed in advance after a few tries. Switching between sizes from one day to the next makes the length hard to predict, so this solver stays with the 6x6 for a few weeks before trying a larger board.

For a solver who wants a puzzle on a phone or tablet, NumFall offers a Daily Drop, one puzzle a day that is the same for every player, with a streak counter, and it has no ads, no accounts and no purchases. NumFall is on the App Store.

In the early-afternoon slot, the solver plays a once-a-day puzzle, closes it, and goes back to the afternoon's work. The session starts at 1:00 and stops at 1:20, or as soon as the grid is done.

Stopping on time with a plan

A solver might plan two sessions of 10 minutes each, one after lunch and one before dinner, with a rule to stop after one set of ten levels. This plan with round numbers is hypothetical. Before the first session, the solver writes the stop time on a sticky note: start at 1:00, stop at 1:10. The stop time is already settled on the note beside the device, so nobody has to work it out while the puzzle is open.

The end is easier to see with a timer. Before the first move, a kitchen timer or the clock app on a phone can be set for 10 minutes. A paper grid of fixed size shows the end in a similar way: a 15x15 crossword or a small 6x6 board shows how many squares are still empty. A set of ten levels also has a visible end, which is the tenth level.

For one week, the solver can log each session with its start time, board size and stop time. At the end of the week, the solver compares the log with the day: where each session fell, how long it ran, and whether the stop time was kept.

NumFall is made by the publisher of this site. Any health or brain-training points here are general information, not medical advice.