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Gaming Effects on the Brain
- By david Macmillan
- Published 12/31/2010
- Entertainment
- Unrated
If you are a parent, chances are you’ve been spending a good deal of time worrying about whether your child may be spending too much time playing video games and possibly doing damage to their cognitive skill power, relax.
New research is out suggesting that video gaming may have real-world benefits for your child's developing brain. Daphne Bavelier, professor of brain and cognitive sciences at the University of Rochester, has now conducted more than 20 studies on the topic, and, as she tells NPR in in recent interview: "It turns out that action video games are far from mindless."
Bavelier’s studies reveal some telling facts about how video gamers show improved skills in vision, attention and certain aspects of cognition—skills that are not just important for gaming, but real-world skills as well. Gamers, she says, perform better than non-gamers on certain tests on attention, speed, accuracy, vision and multitasking.
Vision, namely, the kind of vision called "contrast sensitivity," that is, the ability to see subtle shades of gray, is apparently greatly improved with gamers vs. non gamers.
"And this is a skill that comes in very handy if you're driving in fog," Bavelier said. "Seeing the car ahead of you is determined by your contrast sensitivity." Skilled gamers also are able to see smaller type size than non-gamers on vision tests.
But which came first? Bavelier also took a look at whether better vision was caused by playing action video games, or whether that vision is a skills gamers bring to the table? To find out, she recruited non-gamers and trained them for a few weeks to play action video games. "At the end of their training," Bavelier says, "they're told, go back home. No more gaming. They're not allowed to play any games.
"When they returned a few months later they had their vision re-checked, and Bavelier found study participants’ vision remained improved, even without further practice on action video games. "We looked at the effect of playing action games on this visual skill of contrast sensitivity, and we've seen effects that last up to two years."
Gamers, Bavelier has also
found, seem to have better attention spans than non-gamers — they are able to stay focused and, according to the NPR report, remain less distracted by what came before and by events in their surroundings. For example, gamers vs. non gamers are able to detect new information coming at them faster. So as a result, they are more efficient at reactive skills. And Bavelier also says that gamers can switch from task to task much faster than non-gamers, making them better multitaskers.
Gaming, says Bavelier, also can improve children's cognitive skills, but there are a few caveats: To being with, there is little evidence to show a direct correlations between gaming and childhood obesity. New devices — like Nintendo Wii, PlayStation Move or Kinect for Xbox 360 — might help game lovers get off the couch, but not much else with regard to health issues. These so-called “movement” games, she says, “typically don't have the same effect.”
There apparently is no difference in benefits for genders. Also in the NPR report it was revealed that, according Brain researcher Jay Pratt, professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, when women who'd had little gaming experience were trained on action video games, the gender difference nearly disappeared. After 10 hours of training, Pratt brought the women back to the lab to reinstitute a spacial cognition test.
"And we found that the women improved substantially, and almost caught up to the men's scores," he says.
Pratt also investigated an area of spatial cognition called "the useful field of view," which is essentially how much of the visual field a person can perceive at any given moment. Typically, there are baseline differences between men and women on this test, with men performing significantly better, according to Pratt. But he found that training on action video games enabled women to significantly improve on this test of visual attention. Pratt says playing these video games changes your ability to learn, and to find and integrate new information.
"Video game players are able to pick up very subtle, statistical irregularities in environments and use them to their advantage," Pratt says. "And these same irregularities in environments are the things that help us guide our behaviors on a daily basis."
New research is out suggesting that video gaming may have real-world benefits for your child's developing brain. Daphne Bavelier, professor of brain and cognitive sciences at the University of Rochester, has now conducted more than 20 studies on the topic, and, as she tells NPR in in recent interview: "It turns out that action video games are far from mindless."
Bavelier’s studies reveal some telling facts about how video gamers show improved skills in vision, attention and certain aspects of cognition—skills that are not just important for gaming, but real-world skills as well. Gamers, she says, perform better than non-gamers on certain tests on attention, speed, accuracy, vision and multitasking.
Vision, namely, the kind of vision called "contrast sensitivity," that is, the ability to see subtle shades of gray, is apparently greatly improved with gamers vs. non gamers.
"And this is a skill that comes in very handy if you're driving in fog," Bavelier said. "Seeing the car ahead of you is determined by your contrast sensitivity." Skilled gamers also are able to see smaller type size than non-gamers on vision tests.
But which came first? Bavelier also took a look at whether better vision was caused by playing action video games, or whether that vision is a skills gamers bring to the table? To find out, she recruited non-gamers and trained them for a few weeks to play action video games. "At the end of their training," Bavelier says, "they're told, go back home. No more gaming. They're not allowed to play any games.
"When they returned a few months later they had their vision re-checked, and Bavelier found study participants’ vision remained improved, even without further practice on action video games. "We looked at the effect of playing action games on this visual skill of contrast sensitivity, and we've seen effects that last up to two years."
Gamers, Bavelier has also
Gaming, says Bavelier, also can improve children's cognitive skills, but there are a few caveats: To being with, there is little evidence to show a direct correlations between gaming and childhood obesity. New devices — like Nintendo Wii, PlayStation Move or Kinect for Xbox 360 — might help game lovers get off the couch, but not much else with regard to health issues. These so-called “movement” games, she says, “typically don't have the same effect.”
There apparently is no difference in benefits for genders. Also in the NPR report it was revealed that, according Brain researcher Jay Pratt, professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, when women who'd had little gaming experience were trained on action video games, the gender difference nearly disappeared. After 10 hours of training, Pratt brought the women back to the lab to reinstitute a spacial cognition test.
"And we found that the women improved substantially, and almost caught up to the men's scores," he says.
Pratt also investigated an area of spatial cognition called "the useful field of view," which is essentially how much of the visual field a person can perceive at any given moment. Typically, there are baseline differences between men and women on this test, with men performing significantly better, according to Pratt. But he found that training on action video games enabled women to significantly improve on this test of visual attention. Pratt says playing these video games changes your ability to learn, and to find and integrate new information.
"Video game players are able to pick up very subtle, statistical irregularities in environments and use them to their advantage," Pratt says. "And these same irregularities in environments are the things that help us guide our behaviors on a daily basis."