video games and their impact on your brain

730 Words2 Pages

In today’s society, most video games are frowned upon. They are labeled as violent and are said to promote laziness among the large amount of people that play them. Video games affect people in many ways, but not all in bad ways. Most games contain several common properties: unpredictability, intense speed, high perceptual, cognitive and motor load, the selection between multiple action plans and an emphasis on peripheral processing. All of these properties lead to better memory, and motor skills., and problem solving. The focus of this paper is to collect research information to prove that video games have a positive affect on your brain.

Memory is one of the most important skills a person can have. And unfortunately, it is common for it to fade. Video games have a way of helping people maintain and even improve your overall memory. A study by Kara Blacker and Kim Curby looked at the memory of college gamers. They used 120 students, both male and female, as their participants. Some students were avid video game users and others never play. They tested their memory skills and found a direct, positive relationship between the amounts of video games a student played and their memory skills. Students that played more games had better spacial memory, short-term memory, and visual perception. Some of the more complex action games are even better for your memory. These games ask you to remember where enemies and resources are located and to remember the complex sequence of events required to attain multiple simultaneous goals. Sports games like FIFA 14 and NBA 14 call for long button sequences that make your character do specific moves. While playing, you have to recall these sequences and press these buttons rapidly and according...

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...es from white noise. This showed that gamers were also faster at making decisions about auditory input. This type of decision-making can be used in real-life situations like driving. If a child were to run in front of a car, the driver with better decision-making would recognize this faster.

Although there is research done that shows video games have some negative impacts on people, the positive impacts outweigh the negatives. Playing video games help you with memory, concentration, problem solving, decision-making, motor skills, teamwork, and even real life skills. The list can go on. If a person is playing video games for long, extended periods of time, it can be harmful. But with moderation and appropriate game choices, video games can be really beneficial. The video game industry is growing and expanding itself, giving the world more ways to use it for good.

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