Video games are useful for development of the brain
Some people are saying that video games, in particular PC games, are useful for development of the brain.
These claims favor younger people, ex. kids and people up to 25 yo., because child brain is in development stage, and since it's developing brain, video games can help or stimulate development or result in better developed brain, ex. higher IQ, problem solving skills and similar.
What do you think about this? is it true or modern "folklore" belief?
How would you justify playing video as useful? or if you are against this hypothesis what is your argument?
It's probably worth taking into account the variety of games, ex gambling games could be classified as not useful because of addiction, strategy games may help in development of problem solving skills, FPS games may help in psycho motoric development etc.
If you think games can be useful, what kind of games would that be?
What factors or types of games do you think are harmful rather than useful?
Do you think amount of time spent on games is important and what time span would you assign to playing games as useful?
EDIT:
Philosophical rationale for this discussion:
The answer to this question would require a lot of testing on people and it would take time, ex. at least 20 years of research and testing, to be able to compare the results to those who never played games to draw any conclusion.
In such research a lot of people would have to "waste" their life on playing games to prove anything which would likely be too expensive.
AFAIK, no such extensive research has been done, games are a new thing, and it would likely take a lot of survey and research effort, therefore I think it's a valid philosophical question, ex. to draw some hypothesis or conclusions on whether it is worth it to conduct such research.
These claims favor younger people, ex. kids and people up to 25 yo., because child brain is in development stage, and since it's developing brain, video games can help or stimulate development or result in better developed brain, ex. higher IQ, problem solving skills and similar.
What do you think about this? is it true or modern "folklore" belief?
How would you justify playing video as useful? or if you are against this hypothesis what is your argument?
It's probably worth taking into account the variety of games, ex gambling games could be classified as not useful because of addiction, strategy games may help in development of problem solving skills, FPS games may help in psycho motoric development etc.
If you think games can be useful, what kind of games would that be?
What factors or types of games do you think are harmful rather than useful?
Do you think amount of time spent on games is important and what time span would you assign to playing games as useful?
EDIT:
Philosophical rationale for this discussion:
The answer to this question would require a lot of testing on people and it would take time, ex. at least 20 years of research and testing, to be able to compare the results to those who never played games to draw any conclusion.
In such research a lot of people would have to "waste" their life on playing games to prove anything which would likely be too expensive.
AFAIK, no such extensive research has been done, games are a new thing, and it would likely take a lot of survey and research effort, therefore I think it's a valid philosophical question, ex. to draw some hypothesis or conclusions on whether it is worth it to conduct such research.
Comments (29)
Generally speaking I think video games are likely better than social media sites like Instagram.
There have been multiple studies about the effects of video games since video games began. That is why I stated last time I looked (maybe 2-3 yrs ago) there was no conclusive evidence that IQ was effected and that in other areas (such as social ability) the results were mostly neutral or positive.
Don't you think to study the effect of games on IQ requires observing an individual over a period of time, ex. from childhood to grown up man, that is, at least 10 years.
And then the result should be based on not a single person but at least 100 of them.
Have you done even a tiny bit of research … I don’t think so.
If you don't mind me intruding, where did @SpaceDweller say they exist only 10 years?
Your instincts are correct. All you have to do is look for the studied already made. Like I said, I have no idea what has come about in the last few years but know that studies before then didn’t show a great deal in terms of IQ (if there was any it was slightly positive).
The studies have been done and continue to be done too no doubt. If you are asking how they can best be carried out I would suggest via neurosciences rather than just by psychological self-assessed testing.
IQ tests are in and of themselves not exactly a ‘hard science’ measuring g but they appear to be the best we have and do a good enough job to point out that g exists (or rather was discovered via such testing).
The biggest problem with psychological testing is you cannot really factor in every other single effect so any results you get over a long period of time would be diluted. The larger the set the clearer the overall picture, but tests within certain smaller sets can shed light on other factors too.
This is more or less something for an experimental scientist to deal with and given that psychology is a particularly weak science (in terms of rigidity) neuroscientists are probably the best route to take.
Quoting I like sushi
You're right I didn't do much research, I did some googling but non of these researches indicate thorough enough tests to draw any conclusions about IQ improvements.
But I don't think it's much important, I'm more interested in specific areas, such as problem solving skills psyho-motoric developments and possible negative consequences if playing game for too much time time over longer period and the kind of games which could be useful for this.
For example games which are aggressive and about killing all around yourself are more likely to make you stupid in real life.
Consider mass shootings is the US, you can otherwise see these things only in games and movies.
For doing such a thing one must be kind of stupid because to get out of it there are only 2 choices:
1.) kill yourself
2.) or go to prison.
Therefore stupid.
Many have made the kind of claims you are making and carried out studies to see … the results were no effect or the opposite of what they expected.
In the absence of corroborating evidence, it's just "modern folklore" to me.
I'm not aware of any scientific studies which test "this hypothesis".
We humans have eusocial traits and any activities, like games, which reinforce and develop social skills it's reasonable to assume are more adaptive than not. This may sound old school but I'm guessing that tabletop card games, war/board games & roleplaying games are much more social activities than solitary ones like PC/console "video games" and therefore tabletop games are likely to be more adaptive for child and adolescent development than video games.
e.g. "Drinking games", (for-profit, mass-media) contact sports, con games, gambling ...
As pointed out above, I think the 'type of game' is the most determinative factor in how adaptive or not a particular game is for assisting early human development.
Interesting. Apart from playing Monopoly when I was a small child decades ago, I have never played any kind of game - no cards; video games; chess; whatever. I have never had any interest in games or in sport, so I am curious about this.
:clap:
Quoting 180 Proof
Children are encouraged to play. I've seen dogs, cats, engage in mock battles with their pups an kittens. I suspect it's part of honing their hunting skills; prey animals too have their own games with, I suppose, escape (from predators) being the skill that needs to be mastered.
However, the effect of games on IQ, that's a different story. We'd need hard evidence and the data isn't as encouraging as we'd have liked it to be. Do sportspersons have high IQ? I don't think so.
Even so the nerd-folk and geeks tend to spend an almost inordinate amount of time gaming and they're usually smarter on average albeit physically, they're in the lower percentile.
The more important question I feel is this: Is the world a simulation game we're playing in nightmare mode (one life's all you get)? Ludic fallacy notwithstanding.
Does anyone here have a Khan Academy account? We learn but we also earn energy points that's used in a game-like ranking system. You should try it out if you haven't already. I guarantee you'll learn, I mean have a ball, oh...what's the difference? :wink:
Krishnamurti is apropos here. He claims, in one of his lectures, take life seriously, life is very a very serious affair, but, he goes on to say, that doesn't mean you don't laugh, you don't enjoy, you get the idea!
There's more...
The big secret is to take nothing seriously.
:ok:
IQ has a fluid range. The base IQ is set by the genetic makeup of the brain while training cognitive challenging tasks can increase the IQ by a few points. Not doing any cognitively challenging tasks will lower it by a few points. Tasks also need to be varied, someone playing chess two hours a day will not get any positive effects after, let's say, a year doing so. General IQ improvements require more than just video games. The most positive effect on children has been 3D spatial visualization improvements and reaction times on recognition, but further outside of that requires a heavy load of in-game puzzles that are varied, but even then there's a limit to what video games can provide. A kid playing games their entire childhood but skipping other activities will develop good skills in certain areas, but be extremely lacking in others. A broad increase in IQ and cognitive functions requires varied inputs and activities, which video games alone won't be enough for.
This is not my opinion. It is the conclusions drawn from numerous studies. Maybe there has been something more recent I don’t know about? I have not looked into for a few years.
IQ basically measures ‘g’. IQ tests were originally designed to help identify students who struggled.
There are many case studies that also show how IQ test score are effected by the environment prior to taking the test where scores vary by as much as 10 points. Positive reinforcement and such can have a huge effect on performance.
Again, these are not my opinions. These are repeated studies.
That's not what you said though
Quoting I like sushi
I don't disagree with there being a positive effect, that's my point, the positive effect has been shown. I'm expanding on that positive effect with the point about general IQ not being affected much since it relates to more areas than just the ones you get positive effects on by playing video games. I.e you get a positive effect, but you need everything else combined with playing video games to get the necessary amplified effect. In basic terms, IQ is nothing without the practical application verifying to your brain what the training was for. You can push IQ, but solidifying it requires a combination of behaviors and thought processes as a whole.
You just failed your language comprehension test :D
One says that there's no conclusive evidence for neither positive nor negative, the other that there's evidence for the positive. I'd say those are contradictory. If it's inconclusive there's nothing pointing to the positive over the negative, but you say that it leans towards the positive.
I'd say you can write it more clearly: The studies have shown it to be more positive than negative, but more studies need to be conducted for it to be conclusive enough. That's more clear rhetoric.
But, I'd say there are enough studies to conclude the positive effects. Just not to extent that some argue for.
Genes don't wear make-up. Even no basic one. They just deliver proteins.