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Having only read the abstract and key points: The question is if video games have a better positive impact on cognitive abilities than other things you could do

by WA 10y ago

Having only read the abstract and key points: The question is if video games have a better positive impact on cognitive abilities than other things you could do in the meantime that may also improve other abilities as well. I write this because I quit video games almost entirely a year ago. I played probably 500-700 hours of video games in 2015. I played occasionally simple games on my phone in 2016. The major downside for me was that I felt video games only improve my ability to play video games. I favored online games over single player games, but at the same time, I felt the addiction behind it. I can't play video games "for fun". I want to be good and that costs time. Video games have the downside of giving players easy rewards. I think it does something bad to your brain. Not necessarily altering it forever, but at least turning one into a little dopamine junkie. In 2016, I spend about 40 times 3 hours in a private art school. I improved my drawing and painting skills a lot in merely 120 hours. That was a much better investment of my time than video games and I wonder if the forced concentration of looking at objects and colors for 3 hours straight had comparable improvements of cognitive abilities. Anyways, what I want to say is this: If you feel that you're wasting too much time on video games, despite what research tries to spin positively about it, try to quit them and see what happens.

alexpetralia 10y ago
Quitting games was probably the best thing that ever happened to me (without exaggeration) - my only regret is not having done it sooner.
- croon 10y ago
  * Was it because you were addicted? * What games did you play? * What was missing, what did you end up doing instead? * Was the gaming you did social or not, challenging or not? That you made the right choice for yourself is great, but without any context, no one else can understand why it was good for you. It is likely not a universal truth.
  - alexpetralia 10y ago
    Great point, which hits on the problem of trying to extrapolate from anecdote. In retrospect, I should have clarified more so others can see if their circumstances approximated my own, and if they could then draw similar conclusions (full well recognizing the reliance upon anecdotal evidence to begin with).
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
JetSpiegel 10y ago
Maybe you are paying the wrong kind of games? I think online competitive games, like esports, only make you better at playing games, but other single player games are comparable artforms and only nominally "pointless wastes if time".
- WA 10y ago
  I had a few hours of single player games. The advantage is that they're over and get boring after a while. At least in story mode. I played Super Mario on iOS. It's a neat game and indeed, it got boring after I got all green coins and all characters. Games getting boring is a good thing! But the real good ones keep you engaged forever. That's the problem ;)
  - brachi 10y ago
    Good ones for you or the publisher? Good games in single player mode are like good movie or tv show: no matter how good you might probably watch it once a year, and maybe inspire you to do other things. E.g. Tomb Raider (the 2013 version) was such a great game that inspired me to travel more.
  - ronjouch 10y ago
    I'll pinch my two cents into JetSpiegel's bowl when s/he suggests that "maybe you are paying the wrong kind of games? [...] other single player games are comparable artforms and only nominally 'pointless wastes if time'". Here are some games I enjoyed in 2016: #1. The Witness, The Talos Principle, Her Story, Inside, Firewatch, Near Death, Event[0]. #2. Alien Isolation, SOMA, Grow Up. #3. Furi, Thumper, DOOM 2016. Why do I group them this way? #1 is "story/thinking", #3 is "immersion", #3 is "hard". I like games when they tell me stories (#1), much like a good movie. I enjoy the fact that being active in them contributes to making them sometimes even more immersive than a good movie (#2), and finally (and maybe this one is a bit closer to your feelings) I enjoy when they're so stupidly hard they make your heart pound when you've almost beaten this boss and gaaaaah no, dead again, retry (#3). I'm not in any way trying to make you adhere to these categories (to each his own), just showing that games only have to be brainless dopamine-hit-based time-wasters if your let your choice of games make them so. The Witness is a remarkable adventure in learning and witnessing (gah) your own errors. Alien Isolation is the best Alien I've ever experienced in my body, regardless of medium. Firewatch is a human tale. Etc. Remains the "they waste time" point. True, and so is watching a season of Black Mirror. On my side, I've 1. Come to peace with the fact that I'm not going to be 100% "productive" 100% of the time. All the time I played Witness was not spent learning Rust or taking an art course like yours. Alright. 2. Learned to consider what a game might bring to me and take from me before buying. I remain below a waste threshold (a. Bring/Take ratio too low, or b. Take obscenely high) by fleeing MMOs and CandyCrushes and rogue-likes and loot simulators like plague, and never ever chase coins/characters/achievements. Can you expand on the kind of games you tried and why/how you consider single-player games boring?
tygritus 10y ago
I'm in the process of quitting right now. I've taken up violin and weight-lifting, after being inconsistent for some years. Glad to see someone of the same mindset!
Agentlien 10y ago
If you cannot play games just for fun, then I definitely see how it can feel like a stressful affair and an unhealthy addiction. And if that's your relationship to games, then not playing them does sound like a very reasonable choice. On the other end of the spectrum, I myself see video games as my big passion and it's a large part of what I do to unwind and have fun. I would estimate that I typically play 10-20 hours of video games a week in my spare time. In fact, I'm passionate enough about games that I decided from a young age that I wanted to dedicate myself full time to game development and, consequently, that is what I do for a living as a Software Engineer at Ghost Games. So, that is another 40 hours a week that I spend on games. But I do play games simply to have fun and there is the occasional week when I simply don't feel like it. And then I fill my spare time with other activities I enjoy.
- rublev 10y ago
  >If you cannot play games just for fun, then I definitely see how it can feel like a stressful affair and an unhealthy addiction. The stress is in the losing.
  - jonmb 10y ago
    Agreed, and this tends to be mostly an aspect of competitive multiplayer gaming. As my spare time for video gaming has diminished, I've been sticking to cooperative online games where all players are on the same team (like Diablo 3), or just playing offline. Replaying the classics is also fun. Will Super Mario Bros 3 ever cease to be enjoyable? Doesn't seem so.
  - notheguyouthink 10y ago
    Hell, it's in the winning too. MOBAs are a great example of a game i hate to win or lose, but (not currently) play purely for the rush, teamfights, depth in meta, etc. No game has made me hate winning more than DoTA. It's quite astounding, really. I can fully not-enjoy a match and turn right around and want to play another to hopefully get a good match. Not one i win, specifically, but one that is enjoyable, even if a loss - which entirely depends on the players. I quit playing DoTA (currently) not because of the feelings, but because of the time investment. Long games mean long iteration cycles on my above "just one more game, i want a good game". At 40m chunks, suddenly you're entire night was gone and all i wanted was one game that didn't make me feel like hell. Yes, this is all very addiction sounding, and it's likely not wrong.
lillesvin 10y ago
> I think it does something bad to your brain. Not necessarily altering it forever, but at least turning one into a little dopamine junkie. Arguably we are inherently dopamine junkies and gaming is just one way to feed that addiction, learning other skills — like painting, playing an instrument, etc. — is another.
- jacobush 10y ago
  Upvote but I think games can make the patience for gratification be too low. So we only become capable of doing things which gives instant gratification.
  - Agentlien 10y ago
    I would say that depends entirely on the game itself. I agree that a lot of games are guilty of serving lots of cheap dopamine fixes. In fact, that is the business model of a large portion of the mobile gaming industry. As an avid gamer, I find this sad and I do my best to stay clear of those games. One of my favourite games is the antithesis of this, at least the way I play it. Namely Hitman: Blood Money, where I spent countless hours trying to complete every mission without hurting anyone other than the targets and without ever being detected. Without checkpoints, of course. That requires a lot of patience and leads to hours of tension and suspense culminating in a few intense bursts of excitement and satisfaction.
TulliusCicero 10y ago
> Having only read the abstract and key points: The question is if video games have a better positive impact on cognitive abilities than other things you could do in the meantime that may also improve other abilities as well. You're right that this is a good question. My guess is that compared to other common activities and hobbies, the answer is yes. Most people aren't spending the bulk of their free time solving mathematical riddles, after all, they're hanging out with friends, they're shopping, watching TV, playing sports, etc. And those are all fine things, but given the purely mental challenge involved in video games, the cognitive benefits there are probably relatively high. There are undoubtedly more efficient ways to improve your brain, but they're probably a lot less fun than video games.
- justinator 10y ago
  I would def. disagree with your analysis on the mental challenges involved with free time activities, other than video games. There's a huge mental part of sports in re: to strategy and team playing. Even solitary sports requires a huge mental effort under duress. Think about a rock climb - or trying to PR in a foot race - your brain is firing nonstop to analysis your surroundings to not fall/go as fast as possible. Other people like to take things apart and put them together again, like a car, or a motorcycle. Other people write fiction - are you saying that weaving a complicated plot isn't a mental challenge?
  - TulliusCicero 10y ago
    > There's a huge mental part of sports in re: to strategy and team playing. I've played sports competitively too, while you're right there's a large mental component, it's nevertheless smaller than video games, since physicality/muscle memory tends to be the dominant factor. It doesn't matter if you're a strategic genius and your opponent is a moron in tennis if their core skills are flat out superior to yours or you're terribly out of shape. > Other people like to take things apart and put them together again, like a car, or a motorcycle. > Other people write fiction - are you saying that weaving a complicated plot isn't a mental challenge? These hobbies aren't exactly rare, but they're not really competitors to gaming, either, in terms of time consumed. Gaming is unusual in that it's mentally demanding and also super popular and widespread. Yeah learning languages or musical instruments undoubtedly improves cognitive function as well, but collectively people don't spend nearly as much time on those things as video games.
warcode 10y ago
Competitive video games also make me better at rapid decision making under pressure, prediction, (clear) communication and teamwork. In the same way I could say that drawing and painting only makes you better at drawing and painting.
- ptero 10y ago
  Drawing and painting help you look at things differently; it improves motor skills (probably most important for young and old, but has some value for everyone), etc.
- WA 10y ago
  > In the same way I could say that drawing and painting only makes you better at drawing and painting. Absolutely and it's highly subjective. For years, I prefered playing video games to everything else. But now I'd rather see myself as a painter than a gamer. This is not a question of things being better or worse generally speaking. It's a question what's good for oneself.
  - warcode 10y ago
    I agree. If I no longer had any enjoyment or feeling of improvement in gaming I'd probably find something else too.
6stringmerc 10y ago
When I noticed my nice guitar and really good equipment was going unused so I could spend more time in Half-Life / Adrenaline Gamer / CS, which at the end of the day produced nothing really of worth I could trade in real life (a few online friendships evolved I know), it was time to hang up the serious gaming. No more desktop. Barely any console time. I'm perfectly happy with older Angry Birds games and trying to get 3 stars without any gimmicks. That's my fix...well, okay I'll probably get some Forza VW Herbie action in, but the time I don't spend on games is, I like to think, used productively elsewhere (chores, cooking, etc).
falcolas 10y ago
It does raise the question: what are you doing in the remaining 380-580 hours a year? If the answer is TV (or similar), has anything really changed? > I want to be good and that costs time. This applies to everything in life. > I can't play video games "for fun". Probably not a bad choice to change your form of entertainment, then.
- WA 10y ago
  That's a good question. TV/Netflix: Occasionally, but I'm not much of a movie watcher anymore. I think most shows are quite bad and predictable. I can see how they're designed to hit the same dopamine triggers. I binge-watched a few things on Netflix recently, but then I go weeks without watching anything. I spend more time with my son. I spend time in the evening to code or write. I also waste more time on HN. It's certainly not that I put all 380-580 hours into something "better". At least half of that time is similar to video games and I could play video games as well instead. But for me, this isn't about optimizing my time to squeeze out more productivity. It's a subjective impression that games were unhealthy for me, because they require too much attention.
redsummer 10y ago
Are there ANY games which improve real-life skills? Games are often said to improve you in some way, to up-skill you, but I'm not sure I've ever seen evidence.
- hfsktr 10y ago
  I think you could make the case for multiple online games to have the ability to improve a few skills. Mainly games where you are teamed with random players (especially MOBAs) and must communicate and use teamwork. Games like Scrabble might improve your vocabulary. Communication is just as much a skill as any and useful in the real world. That's not to say that it's going to help if nobody has the mechanical skills or if your characters/items are inferior but dealing with defeat could help strengthen your coping skills or you can go back and analyze it and find more efficient plays (analytical skills). Not saying that even a small fraction of people do any of this. Most people probably play games (especially mobile) for just a little break in the monotony of life and put them down when they are done.
- knicholes 10y ago
  I like to believe that Starcraft has improved my ability to multitask. Also, resource management. I'm able to apply delayed gratification to my army by building stronger units that cost more later by investing more heavily in economy/upgrades/technology early on based on the state of my opponent. Also, Ultima Online has a bunch of player-run servers. Someone came out with a client that injects packets to the Ultima Online servers, so I was able to learn to write "fault tolerant" programs. It was a huge motivator for me to learn to be a better programmer.
Pandabob 10y ago
I stopped playing computer games in 2014 after getting a mac, with the exception of some mobile games here and there. I am however looking forward to the Nintendo Switch. I feel like Nintendo games are good fun and challenging, and at their best like works of art. Often multiplayer pc games get really competitive, and demand a lot of time if one wants to feel like they're continuously improving in them.
RUG3Y 10y ago
I'm in the same boat as you, video games are a competitive thing for me. I've been a CounterStrike junkie since CS became a thing in the 90's? I don't remember the year but I've probably spent more than a thousand hours playing that game. I have to win, and I can't stop until I've destroyed my competition. I'm finally at a point in life where I can just let the computer sit and not play, though I haven't quit entirely. I can honestly say that if I'd spent a thousand hours playing guitar instead of CS I'm sure I'd be a lot better off.
Cephlin 10y ago
I think it's worth reading the "Declaration of Conflicting Interests" as that gives you a good insight into the angle this article is coming from and the message of which they want to purvey/push. Based on the abstract, the key points, the conclusion and the Declaration of Conflicting Interests, I feel I have read enough to discard this as some kind of propaganda. They seem to think that gaming is pervasive without going into hardly any detail about why they feel it is pervasive. I mean I'm from Britain and I don't feel video gaming is pervasive in any considerable degree. Maybe the US has a different take on this...
- dcow 10y ago
  So the paper is literally a classic overview of opportunity cost? Zzz
skizm 10y ago
1) I don't understand why improving your drawing and painting ability is intrinsically more valuable than improving your video game playing ability. 2) At the beginning of learning any skill, you will make great strides at first before diminishing returns come into play. "Noob gains" (as it is called in the fitness world) are what you experienced in those 120 hours of practicing drawing / painting. Slowly but surely your improvements will grind to a crawl, some days it will even feel as if you are going backwards. It is like this for pretty much all skills. I do agree if you feel your time is being wasted while playing video games, then by all means stop. It is your free time and you shouldn't waste it. On the other hand, don't feel bad that you're "wasting time" because someone else things painting is more valuable than playing video games.
- WA 10y ago
  1) It's not more valuable generally speaking. For me personally, drawing and painting were things I always wanted to get better at, but didn't want to put too much time into it. I actually never made time for these activities. Now I have more time. Painting seems to be healthier for me, because it requires me to concentrate. Gratification is slow. I get a flow feeling from it but without the addictiveness of games. 2) Right, but once I'm better, I can decide whether to learn a new skill or to keep going with painting. My point isn't about one activity being superior over another one. My point is: Gaming is highly addictive for me and other activities aren't that addictive. Overall, I feel more balanced with no gaming. But is the same true for you? Maybe, maybe not.
drzaiusapelord 10y ago
I often think about turning my game time into productive time, but my game time is right before bed as de-stresser. I play to relax, socialize, and have fun. I need this time everyday. I'm not sure your advice applies to most adult gamers. College students and kids addicted to MMO's and pay-to-win garbage, certainly.
- ionised 10y ago
  This is exactly the way I look at my gaming time. It's no different than reading a novel or watching a TV show, except it's interactive, which I prefer.
acbabis 10y ago
> I can't play video games "for fun". I want to be good and that costs time. Video games have the downside of giving players easy rewards. I think it does something bad to your brain. Not necessarily altering it forever, but at least turning one into a little dopamine junkie. I'm not sure this adds up. I think I get a dopamine fix when I play simple, relaxing games or games with the difficulty set too low, but not when playing to win. Getting better at StarCraft, for example, requires you practice the same openings over and over while focusing on things that aren't particularly fun. You discover just how lazy the human mind is and then feel bad about it :)
facepalm 10y ago
But surely looking at your paintings would be a waste of time that would be better spent learning to paint. No I don't mean that - I don't know your paintings. But supposedly they are works of art, like computer games. What is the justification for their existence, if there are so many more useful things to do? What is the justification for reading a novel? Or watching a movie?
ehnto 10y ago
I noted the same pattern in myself and the affects it had on my ability to concentrate and my desire to work for long periods of time to achieve a goal. However I still play games, just specifically games that are slower paced, more story focussed normally puzzle based. Think Myst, Obduction, Deponia, things of that nature. I found after so long playing quick reward cycle action packed shooters that I couldn't enjoy games like that anymore, and I really wanted to be able to. So it was a conscious decision to try and extend my focus and reward cycle so that I could again. It helped immensely with other things as well. Spending an hour or more to work on my car no longer gets passed over in favour of a few rounds of counter strike for but one example. Overall I agree with your findings and found just being aware of them has helped me get more out of my brain.
anonymouslee 10y ago
This really resonated with me to the point where I had to stop lurking. James Gee (who was also at Wisconsin-Madison for a time) has written a fair bit, mostly positive, on learning and games. Here's one of his positive early pieces [1]. But I have a cautionary take which is very similar in spirit to yours. I loved video games as a kid - Double Dragon, Zelda, Mario Kart.. I lost my mom early and in adult retrospect one likely consequence was becoming OCD about save-scumming, because you could go back in time and make things perfect. I'd play Starcraft story-mode until I made it through without losing a single unit. I'd savescum ADOM at a pool until I got enough wishes and all the resistances to feel satisfied. Or Civ to build all the wonders I cared about. Too bad you can't go back in time to get your mom to have a checkup before metastasis. Just need to have enough save states right? So I continued min-maxing, building optimization functions against built environments and pvping in MUDs, Goldeneye, MMORPGs, Diablos, Hearthstone, and F2P styled mobile games, competing against other players for virtual bits of nothingness, going with the meta or trying to craft counter-metas, making in-game friends and playing with IRL friends and generally having a good time or so I thought. I finally tossed my gaming baggage while taking my first ever vacation in France with my family last year. I'd recognized the psychological hooks embedded in games for some time but finally realized how ridiculous it was to be conditioned to wake up at 2 AM in the morning (due to timezone differences) to earn timer-based rewards and complete dailies in a mobile app. I was trading off life experiences in a beautiful country with amazing food (and counter to typical stereotypes, very friendly people) for virtual something or others, and enough was enough. Since going cold turkey, the amount of free time opened up has been an eye-opening. I spend much more quality time with my family without being tired from staying up late. I'm playing music again with friends and in a local community symphony, playing ice hockey and working on skills I'd left behind since high school, reading more books, and in general feeling much more fulfilled. This isn't a judgement on those who still love and live & breathe games and there are definitely games breathtaking in their imagination and execution. I still thoroughly enjoy Mario Kart with the kids and could easily drop days into Civ 6 if I had the spare time. But I'd like to level up my physical skills for a while. Climb a 5.12, skate like Sid, play and express Brahms, Beethoven, Chopin and (maybe some day) Rachmaninoff like I wish I could. Some goals in life have a physical timer on them, don't let it run out and lead to regret. There's beauty to be had and made and to be sure, virtual or not, it is fleeting. Yet some skills remain when the power goes out. [1] - http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/Good_Learning.pdf http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/Good_Learni...

by WA 10y ago

alexpetralia 10y ago

Quitting games was probably the best thing that ever happened to me (without exaggeration) - my only regret is not having done it sooner.

croon 10y ago
* Was it because you were addicted? * What games did you play? * What was missing, what did you end up doing instead? * Was the gaming you did social or not, challenging or not? That you made the right choice for yourself is great, but without any context, no one else can understand why it was good for you. It is likely not a universal truth.
- alexpetralia 10y ago
  Great point, which hits on the problem of trying to extrapolate from anecdote. In retrospect, I should have clarified more so others can see if their circumstances approximated my own, and if they could then draw similar conclusions (full well recognizing the reliance upon anecdotal evidence to begin with).
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]

JetSpiegel 10y ago

Maybe you are paying the wrong kind of games? I think online competitive games, like esports, only make you better at playing games, but other single player games are comparable artforms and only nominally "pointless wastes if time".

WA 10y ago
I had a few hours of single player games. The advantage is that they're over and get boring after a while. At least in story mode. I played Super Mario on iOS. It's a neat game and indeed, it got boring after I got all green coins and all characters. Games getting boring is a good thing! But the real good ones keep you engaged forever. That's the problem ;)
- brachi 10y ago
  Good ones for you or the publisher? Good games in single player mode are like good movie or tv show: no matter how good you might probably watch it once a year, and maybe inspire you to do other things. E.g. Tomb Raider (the 2013 version) was such a great game that inspired me to travel more.
- ronjouch 10y ago
  I'll pinch my two cents into JetSpiegel's bowl when s/he suggests that "maybe you are paying the wrong kind of games? [...] other single player games are comparable artforms and only nominally 'pointless wastes if time'". Here are some games I enjoyed in 2016: #1. The Witness, The Talos Principle, Her Story, Inside, Firewatch, Near Death, Event[0]. #2. Alien Isolation, SOMA, Grow Up. #3. Furi, Thumper, DOOM 2016. Why do I group them this way? #1 is "story/thinking", #3 is "immersion", #3 is "hard". I like games when they tell me stories (#1), much like a good movie. I enjoy the fact that being active in them contributes to making them sometimes even more immersive than a good movie (#2), and finally (and maybe this one is a bit closer to your feelings) I enjoy when they're so stupidly hard they make your heart pound when you've almost beaten this boss and gaaaaah no, dead again, retry (#3). I'm not in any way trying to make you adhere to these categories (to each his own), just showing that games only have to be brainless dopamine-hit-based time-wasters if your let your choice of games make them so. The Witness is a remarkable adventure in learning and witnessing (gah) your own errors. Alien Isolation is the best Alien I've ever experienced in my body, regardless of medium. Firewatch is a human tale. Etc. Remains the "they waste time" point. True, and so is watching a season of Black Mirror. On my side, I've 1. Come to peace with the fact that I'm not going to be 100% "productive" 100% of the time. All the time I played Witness was not spent learning Rust or taking an art course like yours. Alright. 2. Learned to consider what a game might bring to me and take from me before buying. I remain below a waste threshold (a. Bring/Take ratio too low, or b. Take obscenely high) by fleeing MMOs and CandyCrushes and rogue-likes and loot simulators like plague, and never ever chase coins/characters/achievements. Can you expand on the kind of games you tried and why/how you consider single-player games boring?

tygritus 10y ago

I'm in the process of quitting right now. I've taken up violin and weight-lifting, after being inconsistent for some years. Glad to see someone of the same mindset!

Agentlien 10y ago

If you cannot play games just for fun, then I definitely see how it can feel like a stressful affair and an unhealthy addiction. And if that's your relationship to games, then not playing them does sound like a very reasonable choice. On the other end of the spectrum, I myself see video games as my big passion and it's a large part of what I do to unwind and have fun. I would estimate that I typically play 10-20 hours of video games a week in my spare time. In fact, I'm passionate enough about games that I decided from a young age that I wanted to dedicate myself full time to game development and, consequently, that is what I do for a living as a Software Engineer at Ghost Games. So, that is another 40 hours a week that I spend on games. But I do play games simply to have fun and there is the occasional week when I simply don't feel like it. And then I fill my spare time with other activities I enjoy.

rublev 10y ago
>If you cannot play games just for fun, then I definitely see how it can feel like a stressful affair and an unhealthy addiction. The stress is in the losing.
- jonmb 10y ago
  Agreed, and this tends to be mostly an aspect of competitive multiplayer gaming. As my spare time for video gaming has diminished, I've been sticking to cooperative online games where all players are on the same team (like Diablo 3), or just playing offline. Replaying the classics is also fun. Will Super Mario Bros 3 ever cease to be enjoyable? Doesn't seem so.
- notheguyouthink 10y ago
  Hell, it's in the winning too. MOBAs are a great example of a game i hate to win or lose, but (not currently) play purely for the rush, teamfights, depth in meta, etc. No game has made me hate winning more than DoTA. It's quite astounding, really. I can fully not-enjoy a match and turn right around and want to play another to hopefully get a good match. Not one i win, specifically, but one that is enjoyable, even if a loss - which entirely depends on the players. I quit playing DoTA (currently) not because of the feelings, but because of the time investment. Long games mean long iteration cycles on my above "just one more game, i want a good game". At 40m chunks, suddenly you're entire night was gone and all i wanted was one game that didn't make me feel like hell. Yes, this is all very addiction sounding, and it's likely not wrong.

lillesvin 10y ago

> I think it does something bad to your brain. Not necessarily altering it forever, but at least turning one into a little dopamine junkie. Arguably we are inherently dopamine junkies and gaming is just one way to feed that addiction, learning other skills — like painting, playing an instrument, etc. — is another.

jacobush 10y ago
Upvote but I think games can make the patience for gratification be too low. So we only become capable of doing things which gives instant gratification.
- Agentlien 10y ago
  I would say that depends entirely on the game itself. I agree that a lot of games are guilty of serving lots of cheap dopamine fixes. In fact, that is the business model of a large portion of the mobile gaming industry. As an avid gamer, I find this sad and I do my best to stay clear of those games. One of my favourite games is the antithesis of this, at least the way I play it. Namely Hitman: Blood Money, where I spent countless hours trying to complete every mission without hurting anyone other than the targets and without ever being detected. Without checkpoints, of course. That requires a lot of patience and leads to hours of tension and suspense culminating in a few intense bursts of excitement and satisfaction.

TulliusCicero 10y ago

> Having only read the abstract and key points: The question is if video games have a better positive impact on cognitive abilities than other things you could do in the meantime that may also improve other abilities as well. You're right that this is a good question. My guess is that compared to other common activities and hobbies, the answer is yes. Most people aren't spending the bulk of their free time solving mathematical riddles, after all, they're hanging out with friends, they're shopping, watching TV, playing sports, etc. And those are all fine things, but given the purely mental challenge involved in video games, the cognitive benefits there are probably relatively high. There are undoubtedly more efficient ways to improve your brain, but they're probably a lot less fun than video games.

justinator 10y ago
I would def. disagree with your analysis on the mental challenges involved with free time activities, other than video games. There's a huge mental part of sports in re: to strategy and team playing. Even solitary sports requires a huge mental effort under duress. Think about a rock climb - or trying to PR in a foot race - your brain is firing nonstop to analysis your surroundings to not fall/go as fast as possible. Other people like to take things apart and put them together again, like a car, or a motorcycle. Other people write fiction - are you saying that weaving a complicated plot isn't a mental challenge?
- TulliusCicero 10y ago
  > There's a huge mental part of sports in re: to strategy and team playing. I've played sports competitively too, while you're right there's a large mental component, it's nevertheless smaller than video games, since physicality/muscle memory tends to be the dominant factor. It doesn't matter if you're a strategic genius and your opponent is a moron in tennis if their core skills are flat out superior to yours or you're terribly out of shape. > Other people like to take things apart and put them together again, like a car, or a motorcycle. > Other people write fiction - are you saying that weaving a complicated plot isn't a mental challenge? These hobbies aren't exactly rare, but they're not really competitors to gaming, either, in terms of time consumed. Gaming is unusual in that it's mentally demanding and also super popular and widespread. Yeah learning languages or musical instruments undoubtedly improves cognitive function as well, but collectively people don't spend nearly as much time on those things as video games.

warcode 10y ago

Competitive video games also make me better at rapid decision making under pressure, prediction, (clear) communication and teamwork. In the same way I could say that drawing and painting only makes you better at drawing and painting.

ptero 10y ago
Drawing and painting help you look at things differently; it improves motor skills (probably most important for young and old, but has some value for everyone), etc.
WA 10y ago
> In the same way I could say that drawing and painting only makes you better at drawing and painting. Absolutely and it's highly subjective. For years, I prefered playing video games to everything else. But now I'd rather see myself as a painter than a gamer. This is not a question of things being better or worse generally speaking. It's a question what's good for oneself.
- warcode 10y ago
  I agree. If I no longer had any enjoyment or feeling of improvement in gaming I'd probably find something else too.

6stringmerc 10y ago

When I noticed my nice guitar and really good equipment was going unused so I could spend more time in Half-Life / Adrenaline Gamer / CS, which at the end of the day produced nothing really of worth I could trade in real life (a few online friendships evolved I know), it was time to hang up the serious gaming. No more desktop. Barely any console time. I'm perfectly happy with older Angry Birds games and trying to get 3 stars without any gimmicks. That's my fix...well, okay I'll probably get some Forza VW Herbie action in, but the time I don't spend on games is, I like to think, used productively elsewhere (chores, cooking, etc).

falcolas 10y ago

It does raise the question: what are you doing in the remaining 380-580 hours a year? If the answer is TV (or similar), has anything really changed? > I want to be good and that costs time. This applies to everything in life. > I can't play video games "for fun". Probably not a bad choice to change your form of entertainment, then.

WA 10y ago
That's a good question. TV/Netflix: Occasionally, but I'm not much of a movie watcher anymore. I think most shows are quite bad and predictable. I can see how they're designed to hit the same dopamine triggers. I binge-watched a few things on Netflix recently, but then I go weeks without watching anything. I spend more time with my son. I spend time in the evening to code or write. I also waste more time on HN. It's certainly not that I put all 380-580 hours into something "better". At least half of that time is similar to video games and I could play video games as well instead. But for me, this isn't about optimizing my time to squeeze out more productivity. It's a subjective impression that games were unhealthy for me, because they require too much attention.

redsummer 10y ago

Are there ANY games which improve real-life skills? Games are often said to improve you in some way, to up-skill you, but I'm not sure I've ever seen evidence.

hfsktr 10y ago
I think you could make the case for multiple online games to have the ability to improve a few skills. Mainly games where you are teamed with random players (especially MOBAs) and must communicate and use teamwork. Games like Scrabble might improve your vocabulary. Communication is just as much a skill as any and useful in the real world. That's not to say that it's going to help if nobody has the mechanical skills or if your characters/items are inferior but dealing with defeat could help strengthen your coping skills or you can go back and analyze it and find more efficient plays (analytical skills). Not saying that even a small fraction of people do any of this. Most people probably play games (especially mobile) for just a little break in the monotony of life and put them down when they are done.
knicholes 10y ago
I like to believe that Starcraft has improved my ability to multitask. Also, resource management. I'm able to apply delayed gratification to my army by building stronger units that cost more later by investing more heavily in economy/upgrades/technology early on based on the state of my opponent. Also, Ultima Online has a bunch of player-run servers. Someone came out with a client that injects packets to the Ultima Online servers, so I was able to learn to write "fault tolerant" programs. It was a huge motivator for me to learn to be a better programmer.

Pandabob 10y ago

I stopped playing computer games in 2014 after getting a mac, with the exception of some mobile games here and there. I am however looking forward to the Nintendo Switch. I feel like Nintendo games are good fun and challenging, and at their best like works of art. Often multiplayer pc games get really competitive, and demand a lot of time if one wants to feel like they're continuously improving in them.

RUG3Y 10y ago

I'm in the same boat as you, video games are a competitive thing for me. I've been a CounterStrike junkie since CS became a thing in the 90's? I don't remember the year but I've probably spent more than a thousand hours playing that game. I have to win, and I can't stop until I've destroyed my competition. I'm finally at a point in life where I can just let the computer sit and not play, though I haven't quit entirely. I can honestly say that if I'd spent a thousand hours playing guitar instead of CS I'm sure I'd be a lot better off.

Cephlin 10y ago

I think it's worth reading the "Declaration of Conflicting Interests" as that gives you a good insight into the angle this article is coming from and the message of which they want to purvey/push. Based on the abstract, the key points, the conclusion and the Declaration of Conflicting Interests, I feel I have read enough to discard this as some kind of propaganda. They seem to think that gaming is pervasive without going into hardly any detail about why they feel it is pervasive. I mean I'm from Britain and I don't feel video gaming is pervasive in any considerable degree. Maybe the US has a different take on this...

dcow 10y ago
So the paper is literally a classic overview of opportunity cost? Zzz

skizm 10y ago

1) I don't understand why improving your drawing and painting ability is intrinsically more valuable than improving your video game playing ability. 2) At the beginning of learning any skill, you will make great strides at first before diminishing returns come into play. "Noob gains" (as it is called in the fitness world) are what you experienced in those 120 hours of practicing drawing / painting. Slowly but surely your improvements will grind to a crawl, some days it will even feel as if you are going backwards. It is like this for pretty much all skills. I do agree if you feel your time is being wasted while playing video games, then by all means stop. It is your free time and you shouldn't waste it. On the other hand, don't feel bad that you're "wasting time" because someone else things painting is more valuable than playing video games.

WA 10y ago
1) It's not more valuable generally speaking. For me personally, drawing and painting were things I always wanted to get better at, but didn't want to put too much time into it. I actually never made time for these activities. Now I have more time. Painting seems to be healthier for me, because it requires me to concentrate. Gratification is slow. I get a flow feeling from it but without the addictiveness of games. 2) Right, but once I'm better, I can decide whether to learn a new skill or to keep going with painting. My point isn't about one activity being superior over another one. My point is: Gaming is highly addictive for me and other activities aren't that addictive. Overall, I feel more balanced with no gaming. But is the same true for you? Maybe, maybe not.

drzaiusapelord 10y ago

I often think about turning my game time into productive time, but my game time is right before bed as de-stresser. I play to relax, socialize, and have fun. I need this time everyday. I'm not sure your advice applies to most adult gamers. College students and kids addicted to MMO's and pay-to-win garbage, certainly.

ionised 10y ago
This is exactly the way I look at my gaming time. It's no different than reading a novel or watching a TV show, except it's interactive, which I prefer.

acbabis 10y ago

> I can't play video games "for fun". I want to be good and that costs time. Video games have the downside of giving players easy rewards. I think it does something bad to your brain. Not necessarily altering it forever, but at least turning one into a little dopamine junkie. I'm not sure this adds up. I think I get a dopamine fix when I play simple, relaxing games or games with the difficulty set too low, but not when playing to win. Getting better at StarCraft, for example, requires you practice the same openings over and over while focusing on things that aren't particularly fun. You discover just how lazy the human mind is and then feel bad about it :)

facepalm 10y ago

But surely looking at your paintings would be a waste of time that would be better spent learning to paint. No I don't mean that - I don't know your paintings. But supposedly they are works of art, like computer games. What is the justification for their existence, if there are so many more useful things to do? What is the justification for reading a novel? Or watching a movie?

ehnto 10y ago

I noted the same pattern in myself and the affects it had on my ability to concentrate and my desire to work for long periods of time to achieve a goal. However I still play games, just specifically games that are slower paced, more story focussed normally puzzle based. Think Myst, Obduction, Deponia, things of that nature. I found after so long playing quick reward cycle action packed shooters that I couldn't enjoy games like that anymore, and I really wanted to be able to. So it was a conscious decision to try and extend my focus and reward cycle so that I could again. It helped immensely with other things as well. Spending an hour or more to work on my car no longer gets passed over in favour of a few rounds of counter strike for but one example. Overall I agree with your findings and found just being aware of them has helped me get more out of my brain.

anonymouslee 10y ago

This really resonated with me to the point where I had to stop lurking. James Gee (who was also at Wisconsin-Madison for a time) has written a fair bit, mostly positive, on learning and games. Here's one of his positive early pieces [1]. But I have a cautionary take which is very similar in spirit to yours. I loved video games as a kid - Double Dragon, Zelda, Mario Kart.. I lost my mom early and in adult retrospect one likely consequence was becoming OCD about save-scumming, because you could go back in time and make things perfect. I'd play Starcraft story-mode until I made it through without losing a single unit. I'd savescum ADOM at a pool until I got enough wishes and all the resistances to feel satisfied. Or Civ to build all the wonders I cared about. Too bad you can't go back in time to get your mom to have a checkup before metastasis. Just need to have enough save states right? So I continued min-maxing, building optimization functions against built environments and pvping in MUDs, Goldeneye, MMORPGs, Diablos, Hearthstone, and F2P styled mobile games, competing against other players for virtual bits of nothingness, going with the meta or trying to craft counter-metas, making in-game friends and playing with IRL friends and generally having a good time or so I thought. I finally tossed my gaming baggage while taking my first ever vacation in France with my family last year. I'd recognized the psychological hooks embedded in games for some time but finally realized how ridiculous it was to be conditioned to wake up at 2 AM in the morning (due to timezone differences) to earn timer-based rewards and complete dailies in a mobile app. I was trading off life experiences in a beautiful country with amazing food (and counter to typical stereotypes, very friendly people) for virtual something or others, and enough was enough. Since going cold turkey, the amount of free time opened up has been an eye-opening. I spend much more quality time with my family without being tired from staying up late. I'm playing music again with friends and in a local community symphony, playing ice hockey and working on skills I'd left behind since high school, reading more books, and in general feeling much more fulfilled. This isn't a judgement on those who still love and live & breathe games and there are definitely games breathtaking in their imagination and execution. I still thoroughly enjoy Mario Kart with the kids and could easily drop days into Civ 6 if I had the spare time. But I'd like to level up my physical skills for a while. Climb a 5.12, skate like Sid, play and express Brahms, Beethoven, Chopin and (maybe some day) Rachmaninoff like I wish I could. Some goals in life have a physical timer on them, don't let it run out and lead to regret. There's beauty to be had and made and to be sure, virtual or not, it is fleeting. Yet some skills remain when the power goes out. [1] - http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/Good_Learning.pdf http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/Good_Learni...