Fighting aliens in the living room is good for the brain

Great news for action video game fanatics – researchers have demonstrated that as you “skiet and donner“ your way to victory, you are training your brain to be better at making quick decisions.

So this week’s Neurotechnology Tip encourages you to develop your trigger finger a little, and improve your thinking skills at the same time.

Gamers think faster

The research team was able to demonstrate that game players come to “the right” conclusion about 25 % faster than people who play strategy games.

You read it correctly, not just faster but more accurate – how cool is that.

Why faster fingers mean better decisions

The reason for better decision making ability is because, in order to succeed at playing the game, it is necessary to perform a thing called probabilistic interference.

Probabilistic interference basically means

you have to gather all the bits of information (info you can see and hear),
do some quick calculations in your head to predict what is likely to happen based on the info and
then decide what you’re going to do about it and
finally do it.

It sounds pretty easy on paper but in reality decisions are seldom black and white, they are typically something in between, so they end up requiring sophisticated calculations of chance.

Being able to decide quickly is important

Making decisions is a valuable life skill needed for a variety of tasks. Being able to do it quickly and accurately is definitely a huge advantage.

Think how helpful it is, if you are driving your car and you see something on your right. Your brain needs to figure out whether you are on a collision course and decide whether to brake or not to brake. The wrong decision here can end up in a BIG mess possibly even death.

Practice makes perfect

Playing action video games ensures your brain gets lots of practice and hey practice makes perfect.

So why do video games often get negative press ?

Unfortunately if you spend all your time honing these skills, you end up not practicing other important things, like reading and writing and talking to real people.

So make sure you don’t overdo the video games, but keep fighting the aliens because these skills could make you a world-class performer.

To wire up your brain a little each week ………………..

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