Changes in Scores Throughout the Day in Wordle, a Word-Puzzle Played by Millions of People: Is Morphic Resonance at Work?

Abstract

The current study is an extension of two previous studies using the five-letter word puzzle Wordle to test whether there was an improvement in player performance throughout the day that might be suggestive of morphic resonance. Players have six attempts to solve the puzzle. The previous studies, which used WordleBot to obtain continuously updated performance statistics for millions of players, found inconsistent results. In the first study, the percentage of players solving in one to three attempts increased throughout the day. In the second study, success rates declined across all six attempts. To increase sensitivity in the current study, we sampled over a much longer time span, starting with samples at 4:00 a.m. New Zealand Daylight Time (NZDT), near the International Date Line, where each new day’s puzzle is launched, followed by samples around midday GMT, and ending with samples near midnight Hawaii Standard Time (HST), close to the end of the international day (giving a total span of 43 hours). The results showed that there is a repeatable pattern whereby there is an increase throughout the day in the percentage of players solving the puzzle in one or two attempts, and a decrease in players solving it in four to six attempts. We discuss possible explanations for this pattern, including time-of-day effects, cheating, precognition, and morphic resonance.