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Computer game play reduces intrusive memories of experimental trauma (2015)

213 points by tnorthcutt 5y ago

PaulHoule 5y ago
(1) Research on this has consistently used "Tetris"; who knows if you'd get the same effect from, say, "Xenoblade Chronicles". (e.g. people might not manage the controls, get sufficiently engaged, etc.) (2) "Experimental Trauma" looks like a problem for the Human Subjects Review Board. I've been thinking about a weight loss plan based on inducing a psychogenic fever but I think it would be too rough on people.
- pdpi 5y ago
  This sentence from the abstract basically covers your first point: > We predicted that reconsolidation of a reactivated visual memory of experimental trauma could be disrupted by engaging in a visuospatial task that would compete for visual working memory resources The fact that it was a video game wasn't the important part, and completely different styles of game wouldn't have triggered the mechanism they're proposing. From what they're saying, I'd sooner expect things like or Sudoku or Minesweeper to work, rather than Xenoblade Chronicles.
  - slothtrop 5y ago
    "visuospatial tasks" describe like 99% of video games, XB is just on the more mindless side
    - PaulHoule 5y ago
      My wife would make fun of me because I'd play https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_of_Xillia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_of_Xillia with all of my characters on autopilot.
- taneq 5y ago
  Pretty sure 10 years ago WoW would have worked. I know plenty of people who were hiding in that world from something IRL. > I've been thinking about a weight loss plan based on inducing a psychogenic fever but I think it would be too rough on people. Have you considered just... not feeding them? We know that works.
  - PaulHoule 5y ago
    Not feeding people is stressful for the whole experience. The psychogenic fever seems to have effects that last for at least a month (you're not that quick to refeed) but it is only stressful (but extremely so) when you initiate the experience. We've managed to initiate it in two people a small number of times but we're nowhere near a protocol that would be repeatable.
    - SketchySeaBeast 5y ago
      How do you induce this fever? And how long does the fever last?
      - PaulHoule 5y ago
        The best method I know is "have a fight with your spouse". If you have a good imagination you can amplify your emotions and reach a "fever pitch" even if you don't have anything real to fight it. This raises both of our body temperatures for about 48 hours, I lose about 5 kg over the next two weeks (the weight loss continues after the fever is not noticeable) and kept it off. If I were trying to make it repeatable I'd assemble an encounter group and either have the group gang up on an individual or create a moral injury situation, maybe both at the same time. (e.g. the latter is the most repeatable way to produce harmful stress but the damage is also enduring, if somebody who was in the crowd felt guilty about participating or being complicit in the bullying that's the worst kind of stress you could give someone.) https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(21)00113-9/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0... Tibetans claim to have a way to do it. I have gotten uncomfortably hot when I visualized a phoenix and merged it with my avatar in the physical world but I tested it and it doesn't raise my core temperature. It is very easy to use biofeedback to control your peripheral temperature (that's what a "mood ring" is good for) but core temperature is harder. I measure core temperature with a thermometer that goes under my tongue but maybe I could get one of those in-ear thermometers to be wearable in a meditation session.
duxup 5y ago
I remember when dealing with depression an felt like I didn't have control of my thoughts at times. Doctor told me to "do what you liked to do before it was this way, even if you don't like doing it now". For me that was video games. So I played final fantasy and other games a great deal and found that the issues I was thinking of often did start to fade over time. I don't know if it was the fact that the task required my attention so much or a sort of zen experience I could get with the game ... or just time passing, but it felt like it worked. The only downside I felt was how not "in the world" I was at that time. Not really socializing much and etc in favor of drowning myself in video games. Ultimately I think it helped me cope, but I also was aware that it was a very alluring sort of way of life to work, school, escape into video games, and nothing else.
- lupire 5y ago
  Treatment depression by engaging in activities that promoye depression is certainly risky.
- musingsole 5y ago
  Seems to me it's retraining the network that it is sufficiently far from the source of the trauma which can't happen until experiences fill in -- not to be confused with just time passing; experiences are the unit of time in the mind
- antisthenes 5y ago
  I did this after a traumatic brain injury, and ended up playing too much video games, neglecting other aspects of my health. Can't say that overall it was a net positive experience, although it did get my mind off the trauma and the traumatic memory and it did help moderately with depression (I am not depressed now, about a year later) > Ultimately I think it helped me cope, but I also was aware that it was a very alluring sort of way of life to work, school, escape into video games, and nothing else. Ah yes, that's generally the conclusion I came to as well. I'm scaling it down as of this moment, personally.
- GoblinSlayer 5y ago
  I guess final fantasy is also not exactly depressive.
tnorthcutt 5y ago
Linking the twitter thread I originally stumbled across this from: https://twitter.com/jelenawoehr/status/1445993073494749187 https://twitter.com/jelenawoehr/status/1445993073494749187 And an article that looks like it's covering the same or similar research: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04/09/523011446/how-playing-tetris-tames-the-trauma-of-a-car-crash https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04/09/5230114...
lupire 5y ago
The study studied the intervention against "experimental trauma film" which I think means watching a horrific movie? Not real traumatic experiences.
Trasmatta 5y ago
I had a very traumatic experience at the start of 2020. I remembered reading studies like this in the past, so after it happened I played Tetris on my Switch for a couple of hours. While I did deal with high levels of anxiety for a few months after, I haven't dealt with flashbacks or intrusive memories at all. At this point it feels like a distant memory that I don't really think about at all anymore. N of 1, but it seemed to help in my case. When possible, I plan to do the same following traumatic events in the future.
- pdpi 5y ago
  > N of 1, but it seemed to help in my case. All things considered, I think I'd rather not find out if it helps in my case :(
- tnorthcutt 5y ago
  That's really great! Glad to hear you'd heard about this prior to the experience and were able to successfully utilize it.
  - Trasmatta 5y ago
    Thank you! I'd definitely recommend people keep it in mind as an option for potential future experiences, and to try Tetris specifically, because that's what the studies seem to all use.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- fendy3002 5y ago
  There was a reason behind "tetris effect" after all. Our way of thinking during playing video games is really different than when we're irl.
- celticninja 5y ago
  I honestly have the same studies in my mind and the same plan of action should I ever be subjected to a traumatic experience that warrants it. So well done you, glad it worked
zozin 5y ago
Shouldn't the goal be to deal with the psychological trauma rather than engaging in activities that suppress memories of the trauma? During the pandemic I went down the rabbit hole of the fitness industry. You will find thousands of videos on YouTube/memes on forums that teach people that they can get over an ex by just focusing on getting shredded and developing a killer physique. To me that is akin to what this study suggests: avoid the trauma by distracting yourself with another activity. While self-improvement is commendable, I don't think avoidance tactics are the best way to treat the root cause of the problem though.
- kayodelycaon 5y ago
  That assumes the person currently has the capacity to deal with it. In my own experience, trauma can be too overwhelming. Medication or other interventions may be required before therapy techniques become effective. Video games have fewer side effects than anti-depressants and aren't physically addictive like tranquilizers.
- pope_meat 5y ago
  I think sometimes it might be necessary to create a bit of a buffer between the truama and "dealing with it." When it's still fresh it can be hard to regulate one's emotional state, and it's nigh impossible to "deal" when the thoughts of the situation/event send you in to a really bad emotional state of panic and endless rumination because you either lack the tools for emotional regulation, or utilizing them doesn't even come to mind in the first place. A mind under psychological distress is a messy dark place, and only after the fact do you look back on things and wonder why you spent such a long time suffering instead of working yourself out of it.
  - artificialLimbs 5y ago
    Some do need to escape from the reality to get a bit of relief, and can't handle the confrontation directly too much. That is understandable. But, the panic/anxiety surrounding the trauma after the fact is often due to resistance of experiencing the emotions/memories associated with the event. Allowing the 'bad' feelings in and going through those feelings is most always going to be healing.
Razengan 5y ago
Escaping to new worlds helps you feel better than a shitty reality.
- devilduck 5y ago
  Anecdotal, but there is a middle ground with something like ketamine therapy, where you induce dissociate consciously (and the external reality has an almost alien feeling) and it allows you to have all kinds of thoughts, some of which can be pretty unpleasant, but without the intense and immediate emotional reactions to those thoughts. In the past it has allowed me to work through issues with far less discomfort.
- Igelau 5y ago
  I'm not sure Tetris counts as escaping to a new world.
TheAceOfHearts 5y ago
Playing videogames is another drug with which to escape reality. But at least it gives you something to do rather than spending all your time dwelling in depression, which is why I have around 2800 hours playing Heroes of the Storm. My experience has been that negative thoughts and memories are less likely to occur while playing, especially if you have to communicate verbally with teammates in order to succeed. Making creative works using your hands is another non-digital outlet which keeps the mind focused. Unfortunately, it's not really a permanent solution as intrusive thought and memories begin to show up during downtime.
- abledon 5y ago
  have you considered going through the HealthyGamerGG coaching program or doing their course?
- nverno 5y ago
  Physical outdoor work is another good activity for the mind.
- Pet_Ant 5y ago
  But just like Ativan in gives you an out when it's overwhelming and other coping mechanisms aren't working.
  - sinsterizme 5y ago
    Umm except benzos are incredibly dangerous to take for any extended period. Stay away from them
- 9wzYQbTYsAIc 5y ago
  > Unfortunately, it's not really a permanent solution as intrusive thought and memories begin to show up during downtime. Hospitals can definitely use it as a protocol to help prevent or minimize the establishment of the traditional semi-permanent traumatic stress disorders, though. Traumatic stress can often cause depressive symptoms, but this technique isn’t directly addressing depression - it is addressing the prevention of traumatic stress disorders in the first 24 hours after a traumatic event.
GoblinSlayer 5y ago
Well, computer games are literally made to distract, and mmorpg are even worse: they will outright hog your attention for themselves.
oneepic 5y ago
My anecdata to the contrary. I feel like I've spent about 6-8 hours of my day on average, playing videogames for the past >20 years (I know, healthy, right?), and even during gameplay I still think of all the worst embarrassing moments at school and the shit one of my parents put me through, and the mistakes I've made at work... No doubt games have a suppressive effect pretty often, but whatever my mental process is, those memories always end up floating right back to the surface. I think I'd add 2 suggestions (not a scientist, but I think they're worth considering): 1) it matters whether your mind is fully engaged in the game, or you have some room to bring in these shitty memories (for example, I played quite a few idle games, or MMOs that involved a lot of waiting) and 2) if you still find yourself reliving this shit during gameplay, maybe you're better off seeking other escapes (*let's not get destructive though, ie cocaine/heroin/meth), or doing productive things (sublimation in psychology) and slowly tackling this problem yourself using gradual accomplishments, building your confidence, breaking down events one piece at a time, etc.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
  I once saw something quite wise, which is the difference between a self soothing and self numbing. Self soothing is an activity you can do to handle a stressor you have at the moment and then you can move on from. But if you have to continually perform the behavior and never actually move on, you’re just numbing and putting off the processing part of pain/trauma.
- jimbob45 5y ago
  I have that same issue with playing the piano. I think the problem is that your mind necessarily needs to flail around in the creative process in order to progress unless you're playing the simplest piece on the piano or Tetris on the computer. As such, it becomes increasingly likely over time that your creativity will stumble into something you didn't want to relive and then everything comes grinding to a halt. I'd imagine that the most brainless casual games would avoid this sort of thing.
  - bentcorner 5y ago
    As a child playing the piano became a very weird experience (in hindsight). I'd need to practice until a piece became ingrained in my memory, and the only way I could play a piece would be to not actually think about it, and think about something else. As soon as I thought about what I was playing, I'd forget how to play the song. I wouldn't even know where I was, and could only pick up again either at the beginning or major points in the song. Weird.
ethbr0 5y ago
Hmm. I'm guessing we're not talking about playing Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Half-Life, STALKER, etc here.
- duskwuff 5y ago
  No. The research used Tetris. Their conclusions are likely to generalize to other similar visual/spatial puzzle games (like, say, Bejeweled), but probably not to more realistic games.
dragonwriter 5y ago
Note this is specific to Tetris (and probably generalizes to very similar tasks, but is unlikely to generalize to computer games generally.)
omginternets 5y ago
>We investigated whether reconsolidation—the process during which memories become malleable when recalled—can be blocked using a cognitive task and whether such an approach can reduce these unbidden intrusions. It seems like there's nothing "special" about video games, here, and that anything that sustains attention over a period of hours ought to work. A few decades ago, this might have been prayer, for example. I would expect reading and coding to work as well.
cat199 5y ago
Interesting, and I can definitely see this for tetris, but I doubt you'd get the same result throwing a veteran with PTSD into an FPS .. probably needs a few more experiments to yield conclusion in the title.
madrox 5y ago
As someone who played video games a lot during their hospital stays, this has the ring of truth. I have a lot of intrusive memories but surprisingly 14 childhood surgeries aren’t among them now that I think on it.
CarbonJ 5y ago
There's some overlap here with the therapy technique called EMDR (used to treat acute PTSD). Both EMDR and the Tetris study involve thinking about the traumatic event while experiencing bilateral stimulation. Studies on bilateral stimulation look really promising as a tool to manage trauma: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5061320/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5061320/ (note the before / after section)
- skim_milk 5y ago
  I haven't considered Tetris, but I'm researching the effects of Osu! (a rhythm game that requires heavy eye-movement and tapping) on people's public speaking anxiety. I can pretty conclusively show that people who stream with the tag "Depression" and "Anxiety" on Twitch speak considerably more while playing Osu! compared to other games - sort of like this paper but with live streamers https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26100455/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26100455/ - my interpretation of my data is that people streaming with tags that suggest they are more likely to experience speaking anxiety, speak more while playing games that require heavy bilateral stimulation because they are desensitized to their anxiety. Is there anyone else looking at or any other material on the subject of EMDR + video games? I can't find anything on the subject, which is kind of ridiculous considering how obvious the link is.
  - rpmisms 5y ago
    Beatsaber (Osu! but in VR, essentially), has a similar effect on me. I just... let go. It's really cool to see research to this effect.
  - ZeroGravitas 5y ago
    A theory I found plausible was that EMDR was the brain rewarding you for moving away from a stressful situation, and the eye darting is something you do while moving through a physical space. This made me think of the various games that move through 3D space. Interesting that Tetris also triggers this.
akeck 5y ago
Jane McGonigal is another person doing work in this space. [1] https://janemcgonigal.com/ https://janemcgonigal.com/
motohagiography 5y ago
Even though there is controversy around his ideas, I have an armchair theory about why this study yielded plausibly successful results, and it's that Maslow's "peak experiences [0] provides a framework for it. The armchair premise is that we naturally orient our identity and sense of self according to memorable experiences, and as a consequence, our most intense experiences (good or bad) tend to become a constant reference point for who are believe we are. High and low watermarks in our life become defining to an identity, which our ego then adopts and does its job to defend it (the self) from all threats. You can "become," the trauma, and your sense of self, via the mechanism of ego, protects the integrity of that identity against all potential threats to it - even though the experience isn't you. Video games in this study enabled a kind of re-basing of identity from the experimental trauma by providing an equivalent or greater intense experience which memory and identity can rebind to. It's also possibly why psychedelics are thought to "cure" depression, because by using an intense experience to rebase your identity on memories other than the negative ones, you in-effect redirect your ego to protect the right thing about your true self instead of it reinforcing the negative experience that had substituted itself into your identity because it was so intense. Utter armchair mind hacking, but it's testable. We can treat the ego as a kind of clutch mechanism where you can disengage it to switch gears, and re-engage it to apply the will of self. Intensity disengages it. If you rethink depression as a kind of mental autoimmune disorder where the defense mechanism for your sense of self (ego) turns its aggression inward, a super intense experience can unbind the ego from that identity long enough for your true self to re-establish its primacy. Suicidal ideation in that framework is a craving for that level of replacement intensity, and not necessarily death itself, just something intense enough to release your ego long enough to switch gears. Jumping out of a plane, graduating university, having a kid, winning an award, are all examples of positive peak experiences people remember as reference points to locate their sense of self. What I'm suggesting is the implied underlying mechanism behind the study could be applied more generally to developing more controlled peak experiences that "blow your mind," in a way that dislodges the ego defence long enough that you can overpower a traumatic memory with a current more intense one, so when your ego re-establishes itself, it is protecting the integrity of the new experience as a rebased identity. Crankery, probably, but if you do find a way to blow your mind and it improves your outlook, video games are fun, but I think we need to find more things that really blow minds. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_experience https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_experience
filthylurker 5y ago
What exactly is experimental trauma?
- Igelau 5y ago
  I really had to dig into it to figure that out as well. > We used the traumatic-film paradigm because it is a well-established prospective experimental tool for investigating intrusive-memory development. In this paradigm... participants are shown short films containing scenes depicting traumatic events. Such films reliably induce intrusions over the following week.
nathanasmith 5y ago
I play Half Life 2 to ease depression since I won't tolerate the side effects of SSRI medication. It's the only video game I play and I've beaten it literally hundreds of time. I can fly through the whole thing in about 4 hours on the hardest setting I've played it so much. I don't know why it works and I don't want to even poke at it lest it stop working but when I have an "episode" where everything goes gray I just fire the game up and start waxing head crabs. Pretty soon I'm right as rain. As an addendum, the only thing I don't like about my M1 Mac is HL2 doesn't work on it other than through Crossover Office and even then it's extremely glitchy. If anybody has suggestions to get it running well I'm all eyes.
Arisaka1 5y ago
Since everyone is posting their anecdata here's mine having to deal with chronic pain and the stress of lacking a diagnosis for its cause: Video games distract me like a cat gets distracted by the laser pointer. And when it's time to go to bed and get a shut eye all my worries, anxieties about the pain and unemployment come flooding in and I haven't slept more than 5 hours for months. And when I was younger games helped me with the lack of friends and cope with stuff like my parents being divorce and getting bullied. My grades fell apart too. So yeah, video games like all other reality escapes work, but if you ask me I'd rather get a diagnosis, a treatment and a job than shove my face in the next big game release again. I'd rather play video games the same way a casual/social drinker drinks alcohol, and not like someone doing it to avoid something that's painful.
- quickthrower2 5y ago
  Sounds bad what you are going through. Hope it gets better and you get a good diagnosis. I known that if it isn’t easy to diagnose doctors can be useless in general.
FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
This word "trauma" is really fucking trendy right now. Whenever a thing like this starts, I want to know -- how did it get started? Who was the first person to push this? Seems to me that it sort of started with legit PTSD from Iraq/Afghanistan war veterans after 9/11. And then it got taken up for a little in some feminist circles -- first like, "women who've been raped have PTSD", and then "a bad date leaves you with PTSD", and then, "to be born outside the privileged categories gives you PTSD" (so you can be forgiven for whatever bizarre behavior). But then it died down. Until recently, when there was a big resurgence on a bunch of news outlets -- "trauma, trauma, trauma". I wish I could trace this meme backwards to the source. Clearly people think they can get an advantage out of this idea.
- rukuu001 5y ago
  _The Body Keeps The Score_ is a good intro to what trauma is and isn’t, its history, and how it differs to PTSD. Interestingly, it also covers the absurd lengths the militaries of various countries went to to suppress the idea of trauma arising from the world wars (e.g. ‘shell-shock’ could appear in no US army document for any reason, until the 70s I think).
  - FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
    That's both mildly surprising, given that "shell shock" was coined way back in WW1, and also sort-of not surprising, knowing how CYA institutions tend to be. It's possible I'm being ignorant here, but I'm convinced that, while modern PTSD and the broad class of phenomena known as "shell shock" do have a lot of overlap, there was also something qualitatively different, something physical, to do with the brute force of pressure waves that hit soldiers in WW1, that, say, Gulf War vets didn't usually experience (though of course, sometimes they did). You can find videos of the poor bastards who came home from WW1; they seemed to suffer not just from a kind of mood and anxiety disorder, but from some kind of full-on nerve- or brain- damage -- Parkinson's type stuff. Like, it was well known (but seldom said out loud) that the pressure waves would destroy men's testicles. That's serious. Now think about what a concussion does to your brain, or the slurred speech of a heavyweight boxer (or the more recent NFL concussion scandals, which seem to have been forgotten). I have a feeling that not all "PTSD" is the same -- that, on the one hand, there's chronic adrenaline overdose, and on the other, there's actual concussive damage. But hopefully I never have to develop any real expertise in this subject. Sounds like this is the sort of thing your book recommendation would elucidate. Thanks for that.
hollerith 5y ago
Also, cigarette smoking alleviates anxiety.
- tenuousemphasis 5y ago
  The anxiety of nicotine addiction.
Igelau 5y ago
wtf science > The 12-min trauma film consisted of 11 different scenes involving actual or threatened death, as well as serious injury; the film functioned as an experimental analogue of viewing a traumatic event in real life. Scenes contained different types of context; examples include a young girl hit by a car with blood dripping out of her ear, a man drowning in the sea, and a van hitting a teenage boy while he was using his mobile phone crossing the road. This film footage has been used in previous studies to evoke intrusive memories. The film was projected on a 100-cm × 133-cm screen using an NEC LT25 projector. Viewing distance was approximately 175 cm.

213 points by tnorthcutt 5y ago

(1) Research on this has consistently used "Tetris"; who knows if you'd get the same effect from, say, "Xenoblade Chronicles". (e.g. people might not manage the controls, get sufficiently engaged, etc.) (2) "Experimental Trauma" looks like a problem for the Human Subjects Review Board. I've been thinking about a weight loss plan based on inducing a psychogenic fever but I think it would be too rough on people.

pdpi 5y ago
This sentence from the abstract basically covers your first point: > We predicted that reconsolidation of a reactivated visual memory of experimental trauma could be disrupted by engaging in a visuospatial task that would compete for visual working memory resources The fact that it was a video game wasn't the important part, and completely different styles of game wouldn't have triggered the mechanism they're proposing. From what they're saying, I'd sooner expect things like or Sudoku or Minesweeper to work, rather than Xenoblade Chronicles.
- slothtrop 5y ago
  "visuospatial tasks" describe like 99% of video games, XB is just on the more mindless side
  - PaulHoule 5y ago
    My wife would make fun of me because I'd play https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_of_Xillia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_of_Xillia with all of my characters on autopilot.
taneq 5y ago
Pretty sure 10 years ago WoW would have worked. I know plenty of people who were hiding in that world from something IRL. > I've been thinking about a weight loss plan based on inducing a psychogenic fever but I think it would be too rough on people. Have you considered just... not feeding them? We know that works.
- PaulHoule 5y ago
  Not feeding people is stressful for the whole experience. The psychogenic fever seems to have effects that last for at least a month (you're not that quick to refeed) but it is only stressful (but extremely so) when you initiate the experience. We've managed to initiate it in two people a small number of times but we're nowhere near a protocol that would be repeatable.
  - SketchySeaBeast 5y ago
    How do you induce this fever? And how long does the fever last?
    - PaulHoule 5y ago
      The best method I know is "have a fight with your spouse". If you have a good imagination you can amplify your emotions and reach a "fever pitch" even if you don't have anything real to fight it. This raises both of our body temperatures for about 48 hours, I lose about 5 kg over the next two weeks (the weight loss continues after the fever is not noticeable) and kept it off. If I were trying to make it repeatable I'd assemble an encounter group and either have the group gang up on an individual or create a moral injury situation, maybe both at the same time. (e.g. the latter is the most repeatable way to produce harmful stress but the damage is also enduring, if somebody who was in the crowd felt guilty about participating or being complicit in the bullying that's the worst kind of stress you could give someone.) https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(21)00113-9/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0... Tibetans claim to have a way to do it. I have gotten uncomfortably hot when I visualized a phoenix and merged it with my avatar in the physical world but I tested it and it doesn't raise my core temperature. It is very easy to use biofeedback to control your peripheral temperature (that's what a "mood ring" is good for) but core temperature is harder. I measure core temperature with a thermometer that goes under my tongue but maybe I could get one of those in-ear thermometers to be wearable in a meditation session.

duxup 5y ago

I remember when dealing with depression an felt like I didn't have control of my thoughts at times. Doctor told me to "do what you liked to do before it was this way, even if you don't like doing it now". For me that was video games. So I played final fantasy and other games a great deal and found that the issues I was thinking of often did start to fade over time. I don't know if it was the fact that the task required my attention so much or a sort of zen experience I could get with the game ... or just time passing, but it felt like it worked. The only downside I felt was how not "in the world" I was at that time. Not really socializing much and etc in favor of drowning myself in video games. Ultimately I think it helped me cope, but I also was aware that it was a very alluring sort of way of life to work, school, escape into video games, and nothing else.

lupire 5y ago
Treatment depression by engaging in activities that promoye depression is certainly risky.
musingsole 5y ago
Seems to me it's retraining the network that it is sufficiently far from the source of the trauma which can't happen until experiences fill in -- not to be confused with just time passing; experiences are the unit of time in the mind
antisthenes 5y ago
I did this after a traumatic brain injury, and ended up playing too much video games, neglecting other aspects of my health. Can't say that overall it was a net positive experience, although it did get my mind off the trauma and the traumatic memory and it did help moderately with depression (I am not depressed now, about a year later) > Ultimately I think it helped me cope, but I also was aware that it was a very alluring sort of way of life to work, school, escape into video games, and nothing else. Ah yes, that's generally the conclusion I came to as well. I'm scaling it down as of this moment, personally.
GoblinSlayer 5y ago
I guess final fantasy is also not exactly depressive.

tnorthcutt 5y ago

Linking the twitter thread I originally stumbled across this from: https://twitter.com/jelenawoehr/status/1445993073494749187 https://twitter.com/jelenawoehr/status/1445993073494749187 And an article that looks like it's covering the same or similar research: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04/09/523011446/how-playing-tetris-tames-the-trauma-of-a-car-crash https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04/09/5230114...

lupire 5y ago

The study studied the intervention against "experimental trauma film" which I think means watching a horrific movie? Not real traumatic experiences.

Trasmatta 5y ago

I had a very traumatic experience at the start of 2020. I remembered reading studies like this in the past, so after it happened I played Tetris on my Switch for a couple of hours. While I did deal with high levels of anxiety for a few months after, I haven't dealt with flashbacks or intrusive memories at all. At this point it feels like a distant memory that I don't really think about at all anymore. N of 1, but it seemed to help in my case. When possible, I plan to do the same following traumatic events in the future.

pdpi 5y ago
> N of 1, but it seemed to help in my case. All things considered, I think I'd rather not find out if it helps in my case :(
tnorthcutt 5y ago
That's really great! Glad to hear you'd heard about this prior to the experience and were able to successfully utilize it.
- Trasmatta 5y ago
  Thank you! I'd definitely recommend people keep it in mind as an option for potential future experiences, and to try Tetris specifically, because that's what the studies seem to all use.
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fendy3002 5y ago
There was a reason behind "tetris effect" after all. Our way of thinking during playing video games is really different than when we're irl.
celticninja 5y ago
I honestly have the same studies in my mind and the same plan of action should I ever be subjected to a traumatic experience that warrants it. So well done you, glad it worked

zozin 5y ago

Shouldn't the goal be to deal with the psychological trauma rather than engaging in activities that suppress memories of the trauma? During the pandemic I went down the rabbit hole of the fitness industry. You will find thousands of videos on YouTube/memes on forums that teach people that they can get over an ex by just focusing on getting shredded and developing a killer physique. To me that is akin to what this study suggests: avoid the trauma by distracting yourself with another activity. While self-improvement is commendable, I don't think avoidance tactics are the best way to treat the root cause of the problem though.

kayodelycaon 5y ago
That assumes the person currently has the capacity to deal with it. In my own experience, trauma can be too overwhelming. Medication or other interventions may be required before therapy techniques become effective. Video games have fewer side effects than anti-depressants and aren't physically addictive like tranquilizers.
pope_meat 5y ago
I think sometimes it might be necessary to create a bit of a buffer between the truama and "dealing with it." When it's still fresh it can be hard to regulate one's emotional state, and it's nigh impossible to "deal" when the thoughts of the situation/event send you in to a really bad emotional state of panic and endless rumination because you either lack the tools for emotional regulation, or utilizing them doesn't even come to mind in the first place. A mind under psychological distress is a messy dark place, and only after the fact do you look back on things and wonder why you spent such a long time suffering instead of working yourself out of it.
- artificialLimbs 5y ago
  Some do need to escape from the reality to get a bit of relief, and can't handle the confrontation directly too much. That is understandable. But, the panic/anxiety surrounding the trauma after the fact is often due to resistance of experiencing the emotions/memories associated with the event. Allowing the 'bad' feelings in and going through those feelings is most always going to be healing.

Razengan 5y ago

Escaping to new worlds helps you feel better than a shitty reality.

devilduck 5y ago
Anecdotal, but there is a middle ground with something like ketamine therapy, where you induce dissociate consciously (and the external reality has an almost alien feeling) and it allows you to have all kinds of thoughts, some of which can be pretty unpleasant, but without the intense and immediate emotional reactions to those thoughts. In the past it has allowed me to work through issues with far less discomfort.
Igelau 5y ago
I'm not sure Tetris counts as escaping to a new world.

TheAceOfHearts 5y ago

Playing videogames is another drug with which to escape reality. But at least it gives you something to do rather than spending all your time dwelling in depression, which is why I have around 2800 hours playing Heroes of the Storm. My experience has been that negative thoughts and memories are less likely to occur while playing, especially if you have to communicate verbally with teammates in order to succeed. Making creative works using your hands is another non-digital outlet which keeps the mind focused. Unfortunately, it's not really a permanent solution as intrusive thought and memories begin to show up during downtime.

abledon 5y ago
have you considered going through the HealthyGamerGG coaching program or doing their course?
nverno 5y ago
Physical outdoor work is another good activity for the mind.
Pet_Ant 5y ago
But just like Ativan in gives you an out when it's overwhelming and other coping mechanisms aren't working.
- sinsterizme 5y ago
  Umm except benzos are incredibly dangerous to take for any extended period. Stay away from them
9wzYQbTYsAIc 5y ago
> Unfortunately, it's not really a permanent solution as intrusive thought and memories begin to show up during downtime. Hospitals can definitely use it as a protocol to help prevent or minimize the establishment of the traditional semi-permanent traumatic stress disorders, though. Traumatic stress can often cause depressive symptoms, but this technique isn’t directly addressing depression - it is addressing the prevention of traumatic stress disorders in the first 24 hours after a traumatic event.

GoblinSlayer 5y ago

Well, computer games are literally made to distract, and mmorpg are even worse: they will outright hog your attention for themselves.

oneepic 5y ago

My anecdata to the contrary. I feel like I've spent about 6-8 hours of my day on average, playing videogames for the past >20 years (I know, healthy, right?), and even during gameplay I still think of all the worst embarrassing moments at school and the shit one of my parents put me through, and the mistakes I've made at work... No doubt games have a suppressive effect pretty often, but whatever my mental process is, those memories always end up floating right back to the surface. I think I'd add 2 suggestions (not a scientist, but I think they're worth considering): 1) it matters whether your mind is fully engaged in the game, or you have some room to bring in these shitty memories (for example, I played quite a few idle games, or MMOs that involved a lot of waiting) and 2) if you still find yourself reliving this shit during gameplay, maybe you're better off seeking other escapes (*let's not get destructive though, ie cocaine/heroin/meth), or doing productive things (sublimation in psychology) and slowly tackling this problem yourself using gradual accomplishments, building your confidence, breaking down events one piece at a time, etc.

SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
I once saw something quite wise, which is the difference between a self soothing and self numbing. Self soothing is an activity you can do to handle a stressor you have at the moment and then you can move on from. But if you have to continually perform the behavior and never actually move on, you’re just numbing and putting off the processing part of pain/trauma.
jimbob45 5y ago
I have that same issue with playing the piano. I think the problem is that your mind necessarily needs to flail around in the creative process in order to progress unless you're playing the simplest piece on the piano or Tetris on the computer. As such, it becomes increasingly likely over time that your creativity will stumble into something you didn't want to relive and then everything comes grinding to a halt. I'd imagine that the most brainless casual games would avoid this sort of thing.
- bentcorner 5y ago
  As a child playing the piano became a very weird experience (in hindsight). I'd need to practice until a piece became ingrained in my memory, and the only way I could play a piece would be to not actually think about it, and think about something else. As soon as I thought about what I was playing, I'd forget how to play the song. I wouldn't even know where I was, and could only pick up again either at the beginning or major points in the song. Weird.

ethbr0 5y ago

Hmm. I'm guessing we're not talking about playing Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Half-Life, STALKER, etc here.

duskwuff 5y ago
No. The research used Tetris. Their conclusions are likely to generalize to other similar visual/spatial puzzle games (like, say, Bejeweled), but probably not to more realistic games.

dragonwriter 5y ago

Note this is specific to Tetris (and probably generalizes to very similar tasks, but is unlikely to generalize to computer games generally.)

omginternets 5y ago

>We investigated whether reconsolidation—the process during which memories become malleable when recalled—can be blocked using a cognitive task and whether such an approach can reduce these unbidden intrusions. It seems like there's nothing "special" about video games, here, and that anything that sustains attention over a period of hours ought to work. A few decades ago, this might have been prayer, for example. I would expect reading and coding to work as well.

cat199 5y ago

Interesting, and I can definitely see this for tetris, but I doubt you'd get the same result throwing a veteran with PTSD into an FPS .. probably needs a few more experiments to yield conclusion in the title.

madrox 5y ago

As someone who played video games a lot during their hospital stays, this has the ring of truth. I have a lot of intrusive memories but surprisingly 14 childhood surgeries aren’t among them now that I think on it.

CarbonJ 5y ago

There's some overlap here with the therapy technique called EMDR (used to treat acute PTSD). Both EMDR and the Tetris study involve thinking about the traumatic event while experiencing bilateral stimulation. Studies on bilateral stimulation look really promising as a tool to manage trauma: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5061320/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5061320/ (note the before / after section)

skim_milk 5y ago
I haven't considered Tetris, but I'm researching the effects of Osu! (a rhythm game that requires heavy eye-movement and tapping) on people's public speaking anxiety. I can pretty conclusively show that people who stream with the tag "Depression" and "Anxiety" on Twitch speak considerably more while playing Osu! compared to other games - sort of like this paper but with live streamers https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26100455/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26100455/ - my interpretation of my data is that people streaming with tags that suggest they are more likely to experience speaking anxiety, speak more while playing games that require heavy bilateral stimulation because they are desensitized to their anxiety. Is there anyone else looking at or any other material on the subject of EMDR + video games? I can't find anything on the subject, which is kind of ridiculous considering how obvious the link is.
- rpmisms 5y ago
  Beatsaber (Osu! but in VR, essentially), has a similar effect on me. I just... let go. It's really cool to see research to this effect.
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  A theory I found plausible was that EMDR was the brain rewarding you for moving away from a stressful situation, and the eye darting is something you do while moving through a physical space. This made me think of the various games that move through 3D space. Interesting that Tetris also triggers this.

akeck 5y ago

Jane McGonigal is another person doing work in this space. [1] https://janemcgonigal.com/ https://janemcgonigal.com/

motohagiography 5y ago

Even though there is controversy around his ideas, I have an armchair theory about why this study yielded plausibly successful results, and it's that Maslow's "peak experiences [0] provides a framework for it. The armchair premise is that we naturally orient our identity and sense of self according to memorable experiences, and as a consequence, our most intense experiences (good or bad) tend to become a constant reference point for who are believe we are. High and low watermarks in our life become defining to an identity, which our ego then adopts and does its job to defend it (the self) from all threats. You can "become," the trauma, and your sense of self, via the mechanism of ego, protects the integrity of that identity against all potential threats to it - even though the experience isn't you. Video games in this study enabled a kind of re-basing of identity from the experimental trauma by providing an equivalent or greater intense experience which memory and identity can rebind to. It's also possibly why psychedelics are thought to "cure" depression, because by using an intense experience to rebase your identity on memories other than the negative ones, you in-effect redirect your ego to protect the right thing about your true self instead of it reinforcing the negative experience that had substituted itself into your identity because it was so intense. Utter armchair mind hacking, but it's testable. We can treat the ego as a kind of clutch mechanism where you can disengage it to switch gears, and re-engage it to apply the will of self. Intensity disengages it. If you rethink depression as a kind of mental autoimmune disorder where the defense mechanism for your sense of self (ego) turns its aggression inward, a super intense experience can unbind the ego from that identity long enough for your true self to re-establish its primacy. Suicidal ideation in that framework is a craving for that level of replacement intensity, and not necessarily death itself, just something intense enough to release your ego long enough to switch gears. Jumping out of a plane, graduating university, having a kid, winning an award, are all examples of positive peak experiences people remember as reference points to locate their sense of self. What I'm suggesting is the implied underlying mechanism behind the study could be applied more generally to developing more controlled peak experiences that "blow your mind," in a way that dislodges the ego defence long enough that you can overpower a traumatic memory with a current more intense one, so when your ego re-establishes itself, it is protecting the integrity of the new experience as a rebased identity. Crankery, probably, but if you do find a way to blow your mind and it improves your outlook, video games are fun, but I think we need to find more things that really blow minds. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_experience https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_experience

filthylurker 5y ago

What exactly is experimental trauma?

Igelau 5y ago
I really had to dig into it to figure that out as well. > We used the traumatic-film paradigm because it is a well-established prospective experimental tool for investigating intrusive-memory development. In this paradigm... participants are shown short films containing scenes depicting traumatic events. Such films reliably induce intrusions over the following week.

nathanasmith 5y ago

I play Half Life 2 to ease depression since I won't tolerate the side effects of SSRI medication. It's the only video game I play and I've beaten it literally hundreds of time. I can fly through the whole thing in about 4 hours on the hardest setting I've played it so much. I don't know why it works and I don't want to even poke at it lest it stop working but when I have an "episode" where everything goes gray I just fire the game up and start waxing head crabs. Pretty soon I'm right as rain. As an addendum, the only thing I don't like about my M1 Mac is HL2 doesn't work on it other than through Crossover Office and even then it's extremely glitchy. If anybody has suggestions to get it running well I'm all eyes.

Arisaka1 5y ago

Since everyone is posting their anecdata here's mine having to deal with chronic pain and the stress of lacking a diagnosis for its cause: Video games distract me like a cat gets distracted by the laser pointer. And when it's time to go to bed and get a shut eye all my worries, anxieties about the pain and unemployment come flooding in and I haven't slept more than 5 hours for months. And when I was younger games helped me with the lack of friends and cope with stuff like my parents being divorce and getting bullied. My grades fell apart too. So yeah, video games like all other reality escapes work, but if you ask me I'd rather get a diagnosis, a treatment and a job than shove my face in the next big game release again. I'd rather play video games the same way a casual/social drinker drinks alcohol, and not like someone doing it to avoid something that's painful.

quickthrower2 5y ago
Sounds bad what you are going through. Hope it gets better and you get a good diagnosis. I known that if it isn’t easy to diagnose doctors can be useless in general.

FooBarBizBazz 5y ago

This word "trauma" is really fucking trendy right now. Whenever a thing like this starts, I want to know -- how did it get started? Who was the first person to push this? Seems to me that it sort of started with legit PTSD from Iraq/Afghanistan war veterans after 9/11. And then it got taken up for a little in some feminist circles -- first like, "women who've been raped have PTSD", and then "a bad date leaves you with PTSD", and then, "to be born outside the privileged categories gives you PTSD" (so you can be forgiven for whatever bizarre behavior). But then it died down. Until recently, when there was a big resurgence on a bunch of news outlets -- "trauma, trauma, trauma". I wish I could trace this meme backwards to the source. Clearly people think they can get an advantage out of this idea.

rukuu001 5y ago
_The Body Keeps The Score_ is a good intro to what trauma is and isn’t, its history, and how it differs to PTSD. Interestingly, it also covers the absurd lengths the militaries of various countries went to to suppress the idea of trauma arising from the world wars (e.g. ‘shell-shock’ could appear in no US army document for any reason, until the 70s I think).
- FooBarBizBazz 5y ago
  That's both mildly surprising, given that "shell shock" was coined way back in WW1, and also sort-of not surprising, knowing how CYA institutions tend to be. It's possible I'm being ignorant here, but I'm convinced that, while modern PTSD and the broad class of phenomena known as "shell shock" do have a lot of overlap, there was also something qualitatively different, something physical, to do with the brute force of pressure waves that hit soldiers in WW1, that, say, Gulf War vets didn't usually experience (though of course, sometimes they did). You can find videos of the poor bastards who came home from WW1; they seemed to suffer not just from a kind of mood and anxiety disorder, but from some kind of full-on nerve- or brain- damage -- Parkinson's type stuff. Like, it was well known (but seldom said out loud) that the pressure waves would destroy men's testicles. That's serious. Now think about what a concussion does to your brain, or the slurred speech of a heavyweight boxer (or the more recent NFL concussion scandals, which seem to have been forgotten). I have a feeling that not all "PTSD" is the same -- that, on the one hand, there's chronic adrenaline overdose, and on the other, there's actual concussive damage. But hopefully I never have to develop any real expertise in this subject. Sounds like this is the sort of thing your book recommendation would elucidate. Thanks for that.

hollerith 5y ago

Also, cigarette smoking alleviates anxiety.

tenuousemphasis 5y ago
The anxiety of nicotine addiction.

Igelau 5y ago

wtf science > The 12-min trauma film consisted of 11 different scenes involving actual or threatened death, as well as serious injury; the film functioned as an experimental analogue of viewing a traumatic event in real life. Scenes contained different types of context; examples include a young girl hit by a car with blood dripping out of her ear, a man drowning in the sea, and a van hitting a teenage boy while he was using his mobile phone crossing the road. This film footage has been used in previous studies to evoke intrusive memories. The film was projected on a 100-cm × 133-cm screen using an NEC LT25 projector. Viewing distance was approximately 175 cm.