20+ years ago my friend’s dad told me that playing games made you “think faster“. It was unreal hearing that from an adult and it stayed with me ever since. Now every time I see related articles I think about him. Boy that dad was right all along!
He owned a cybercafe where we would do lan-parties from time to time. His son (my friend) helped and played there. He was crazy good in CS 1.6 and top 3 in leaderboards in a popular MU Online private server. Good times man... good times.
There are definitely some…discussion-worthy things in here, with genres being a big one! I’ve been thinking out loud about this one for a while too and I think there is a brain function-related way that RTS and FPS can be grouped together. Fast-paced may not be it, but there’s something there about needing to notice, process, and react to a bunch of very different information on the screen at once.
All that to say…we need some better genre classifications! :D
Ok so another way of interpreting this, is that fast action paced videogames lead to pattern recognition using at least three of our senses. Which in turn lead to being more efficient thinkers
I had to think on this for a while, so sorry for the delayed response!
I'd offer a nuance...it's like muscle memory but for your brain and thoughts...so thought processing memory?
When you first learn a new physical skill, you're not very good at it. You're trying to figure out how to move your body to get the outcome you want. As you do it more and more, you know the order of muscles you need to use. You become more efficient over time.
I think fast-paced action video games have the same effect on your thought process. Training your thought process like a muscle using video games makes you a more efficient thinker over time.
20+ years ago my friend’s dad told me that playing games made you “think faster“. It was unreal hearing that from an adult and it stayed with me ever since. Now every time I see related articles I think about him. Boy that dad was right all along!
THAT is cool!
I wonder how he came to that conclusion…I’d love to hear his thoughts on why he thought so with games that were available back then!
(which is still in the 2000s I realized…not 1980s as I first thought when I read your post 🤯)
He owned a cybercafe where we would do lan-parties from time to time. His son (my friend) helped and played there. He was crazy good in CS 1.6 and top 3 in leaderboards in a popular MU Online private server. Good times man... good times.
(Just followed and subscribed, love your content)
Grouping RTS with FPS because both are "fast-paced" is doing a lot of heavy lifting for the study's conclusions.
There are definitely some…discussion-worthy things in here, with genres being a big one! I’ve been thinking out loud about this one for a while too and I think there is a brain function-related way that RTS and FPS can be grouped together. Fast-paced may not be it, but there’s something there about needing to notice, process, and react to a bunch of very different information on the screen at once.
All that to say…we need some better genre classifications! :D
Ok so another way of interpreting this, is that fast action paced videogames lead to pattern recognition using at least three of our senses. Which in turn lead to being more efficient thinkers
I had to think on this for a while, so sorry for the delayed response!
I'd offer a nuance...it's like muscle memory but for your brain and thoughts...so thought processing memory?
When you first learn a new physical skill, you're not very good at it. You're trying to figure out how to move your body to get the outcome you want. As you do it more and more, you know the order of muscles you need to use. You become more efficient over time.
I think fast-paced action video games have the same effect on your thought process. Training your thought process like a muscle using video games makes you a more efficient thinker over time.
Does that make sense?
Actually it does! I really like there term thought processing memory btw