Iowa State study links gaming to -- over there, check it out!
by Ben Gilbert 
{ Oct 15th 2009 at 5:30AM }
Oh right, so ... The ISU researcher (not this one) found that test subjects playing games for four-plus hours a day showed "significantly diminished" attention levels to proactive activities. Though you're welcome to draw your own conclusions, you little scientists, this deficiency is alleged to -- cue scientific blabber: "reveal a reduction in brain activity and disruption of behavior associated with sustained attention ability." It's possible you'd have a mess of outraged questions at this point, but let's be honest: you didn't read the whole post, did you?
[Image credit: MarsDD]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Archon (Charity Game-a-thon with live feed on Sat: arhn.eu ) @ Oct 15th 2009 5:41AM
Well... I have trouble keeping my attention ON the games I'm playing lately. I swap discs like a mad DJ, every few minutes, because I just can't stay entertained by a single game for longer than half an hour.
Let's hope Uncharted 2 changes that when I finally get to play it today. The last game that did it for me was Fallout 3 when I finally got into it a couple months ago.
Is this curable, doctor?
jivebuny @ Oct 15th 2009 5:58AM
Yes it is! You play OCD online?? played Arkham asylum ?? if you have the cure is not to play good games anymore! I have compleatly been spoiled buy epic games and nothing else compares at times. I have this problem anyway.
RobLink (Alex Kidd incarnate) @ Oct 15th 2009 6:13AM
Uncharted 2 should help with that - I played 7 hours straight yesterday, got the majority of the way through the campaign and a few MP matches in, and I enjoyed every second of it.
zefur @ Oct 15th 2009 6:42AM
@Jivebunny
I didnt know there was a way to play OCD online do you clean the other persons home and make sure everything is neat and clean?
GewurztraminerX @ Oct 15th 2009 8:17AM
@ zefur
how do you think Microsoft had those high stats from people changing their avatars?
Ghen @ Oct 15th 2009 9:13AM
OCD online, aka World of Warcraft
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 9:25AM
@Ghen
You're thinking of PCP Online.
Fine Leather Jackets @ Oct 15th 2009 11:23AM
The exact same thing has been happening to me, but Arkhum Asylum has really got me hooked, the last game that did that was also Fallout 3 for me.
ElWaster @ Oct 15th 2009 5:45AM
"test subjects playing games for four-plus hours a day showed "significantly diminished" attention levels to proactive activities"
Of Course they do - They're spending 4+ hours indoors on hte PS3 or Xbox DUH! Scientists my ass!
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 6:08AM
A lot of studies show that anything active will reduce attention levels. What this means is, it's easier to focus after walking through the woods than it is if you took that same walk down a street.
The reason being distractions. Things like ads, noisy cars, people shouting, etc. It's more to do with multiple things all vying for our attention than it is to do with gaming itself I'd say.
It just so happens that when you're playing a game you're usually watching multiple things, like health, ammo, distance to nearest town, where your team is, etc. These competing factors can lead to decreased focus.
NoNameforEvil @ Oct 15th 2009 6:18AM
What's wrong with it?
It must be serious to need scientific study.
BigD145 @ Oct 15th 2009 1:29PM
You're obviously not playing the right games. I'd suggest Excel. That should slow you down and keep you focused.
MrSpaceCowboy @ Oct 15th 2009 5:59AM
It's not ADD, I just don't pay attention to things that are BORING AS SHIT.
INTERNET SUPERHERO @ Oct 15th 2009 9:49AM
Yeah the world needs more shoot-outs, explosions and continual police car chases on the interstate...
Patrick @ Oct 15th 2009 10:27AM
...then good luck in this week's new job for you.
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 6:10AM
Coming as a guy who was diagnosed with ADD at an early age (before I had time to game for hours on end), I'd say games are great for me.
I mean I can't sit down and read a book without constantly wanting to get up and walk around or listen to music. Even during high school when I had homework to do I'd finish maybe 2-3 math problems before I started looking around, playing on the computer, etc.
When watching TV/movies/gaming I can just relax, unload, and take part in something without wanting to jump out of my seat every five minutes.
Sturat @ Oct 15th 2009 8:00AM
I think it's much more likely that people with ADD are attracted to video games than video games cause ADD. Were the test subjects selected from a pool of existing gamers, or was it a group of random people who just played games that much for the study?
Ian @ Oct 15th 2009 8:28AM
I can't imagine NON gamers with ADD being able to pay attention to a game for 4+ hours a day.
This is COORELATION, not CAUSATION. Silly scientists.
Evan_ARRRR @ Oct 15th 2009 9:41AM
True. I am also ADD, as are most of my friends. The only thing we all seem to be able to do is sit down and play video games - or smoke some ganja. Anything else, and we'll forget what we're doing before we even begin.
Freedom Town @ Oct 15th 2009 10:10AM
Sorry guys, that isn't ADD, you are just part of a generation of slackers who are f'ing lazy.
Can't do more then a few math problems without stopping? Suck it up and do more, or don't. No one wants to do homework, that is why it is called work. You can sit and watch tv and play video games though....of course....
The only reason we have ADD today in most people is because our sympathetic retarded society condones the behavior, and gives it a nice scientific name.
There are people out there with real ADD, stemming from real psychological disorders.
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 11:25AM
@Freedom Town
Then I guess the doctors were milking the insurance when they prescribed Ritalin for me, which, I should add, did the job quite nicely. Once before school, once mid-way through, and once again after school if I needed to concentrate on homework at home.
I unofficially stopped taking it during high school, didn't like the way it made me feel. Soon after the doctors said they wanted to take me off and see how I did without it anyways.
I almost never did any homework, and even during class had trouble focusing at times, but I was a much happier person overall. I still can't believe I passed Algebra II by acing all the tests and doing good on the final. Considering I did maybe 3 homework assignments out of the 100+ we must've had.
ToTheMoon @ Oct 15th 2009 11:50AM
>>I am also ADD, as are most of my friends.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I think you just don't have patience and you have been conditioned by media. This study supports in part what I've been thinking for a long time. Games are not the only contributors to this rise in people being unable to focus for what used to be normal periods of time. Quick cuts in movies/shows/commercials/news programs are all there to keep our interest level up because it does not give your brain time to think or adapt.
A good example of this is watching a few of the original James Bonds and then watch the last 3 (The Brosnan ones in particular) and tell me if you can see a difference in how they film it. I suspect that most of today's tweens/teenagers will find the original ones boring and too slow for them even because they are used to having things flash and move quickly - Anything else is "boring".
While I don't think this is true ADD, I do believe it is a type of psyche conditioning to make people expect things to move fast. It's the reason why Twitter and Facebook are so popular with the younger crowd. It's short, quick and things change rapidly which is something they like.
I'm not saying that we should go back to the "old" way of doing things. Multi-tasking has it's uses in the workplace for sure (where else can you have a meeting, text your friends, read work emails and write up designs for your new piece of code at the same time?) but I wonder how productive will these people be in the long term? Are they just keeping busy or are they actually accomplishing anything? Based on what I know of History, it has been the people who can focus intensely on one sole task that are the true innovators.
My unscientific 2 cents...
aristokrat @ Oct 15th 2009 12:08PM
Sonicspike:
Not to put you down in any way, but Ritalin would makes it easier for anyone to concentrate. There's a reason that Ritalin/Adderrall/Dexedrine are some of the most abused drugs on college campuses (it lets you study for 8 hours straight without running out of steam, something the human brain isn't meant to do). Same reason that meth has a strangely high level of use in middle-class 30-something businessmen: allows them to get all their work for the week done in one night and then spend the rest of the week with their families. Therefore, it's dangerous to use positive response to stimulants as a confirmation of an ADD diagnosis, because most people would fit into this category (except for people with interfering psychological disorders).
Now, with regards to FreedomTown's point, I was under the impression that true ADD kids weren't even able to sit through a movie without wandering off. I think some of the negative reaction people have to the prevalence of ADD is that a lot of patients seem to be able to concentrate on entertainment but not on work, which is suspicious indeed. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of so-called ADD patients have in fact simply adapted as children to the high speed/frequency of information input that our society currently has, and their brains get conditioned to operate at "high speed", potentially causing the brain to get "bored" with low speed input. This would correlate strongly with the fact that the biggest problems with ADD show up in schools, a medium whose methods haven't really changed much in the last 100 years, while most everything else has (i.e. old movies are much slower and a lot of young people don't like that, old commercials are much more laid back and not as in your face, etc.).
Gamer4Life @ Oct 15th 2009 2:04PM
@sonicspike41 that is exactly in line with what I've heard over the years about people with ADD, screens seem to be able to catch their/your attention.
I wonder how many of their test subjects were ADD to begin with?
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 2:15PM
@aristokrat
I certainly agree that drugs meant to relax people and increase their focus and attention will do just that. I'm not sure exactly if Ritalin can be used to treat anyone though.
Take something like an allergy medicine. I found out (through personal, not so scientific tests) that I sneezed more while taking things like Nasonex than I did without them. This while I had doctors recommending I take them.
Not all doctors are right all the time. I know I've heard several times that ADD is one of the most mis-diagnosed problems in kids today. It's usually hard to tell the difference between a kid who is just hyperactive and a kid who has a genuine medical condition preventing him from focusing.
I still believe I have ADD though. I mean even while typing on the computer I usually can't keep still, I'm listening to music, and I often times will start a rant and get lost half way through it on some wild thought. (Note to self: hurry this up!)
At night while lying in bed my thoughts tend to go something like this:
Days events, my hand, robot hand, Gundam, and finally I realize I got sidetracked (like 10 minutes later) and try to trace my thoughts back so I can remember the original problem.
When doing math work for school, even staring at the ceiling seemed to take more time. I was using an old Win95 machine with no internet at the time (was waiting for a new one), and sometimes even boring things could steal my attention away.
I've been narrating this entire rant in my head, with mental images to match as I type... if it ain't ADD, it's something more than just games, since I had this before I started gaming.
KID @ Oct 16th 2009 8:06PM
It's kind of hard to just sit down and do math problems, when you can't keep all the concepts you are applying to the problems, along with any variables involved, in your working memory for more than 15 seconds. Its like trying to put a puzzle together with someone rearranging and stealing the pieces. Further compounding the issue, for those like me with the predominantly inattentive subtype ,is the lethargy. As you sit there trying to suck it up and just do the problems the lack of processable input starts to take a toll on you. Slowly but surely your arousal level drops. There are two options from this point, sit their in a trance till you get to the point where you probably wouldn't even get up if someone offered you a steak dinner, or go find the nearest source of steady understandable input. Obviously since you don't want to be a dysthymic meat-sack at all hours of the day you go play video games.
Video games allow you to be stimulated sensually and mentally at whatever pace you can handle. In most cases they aren't the cause of the inattention. I think 4 hours of anything every day will eventually wear you down.
Plastic Rat @ Oct 15th 2009 6:13AM
Can somebody summarize this post in as few words as possible for me?
MMLgamer @ Oct 15th 2009 6:43AM
teh video gamezez gif u ADD!!!!!11one
JXCgunrunna @ Oct 15th 2009 7:14AM
And scientists like fruit by the foot.
whylekat @ Oct 15th 2009 10:41AM
Especially when the fruit by the foot Has other shapes built in! But for some reason only kids could create that genious technology while the humble scientists scratch their heads in amazement.
Premature ejaculation man @ Oct 15th 2009 6:15AM
THIS IS OUTRAGEO-butterfly!!
Plastic Rat @ Oct 15th 2009 6:18AM
Watch out with those things. Scientists once did a study and they found that people who like butterlies showed a higher chance of becoming folk singers later in life.
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 6:57AM
And apparently Country is the genre of music most likely to cause someone to commit suicide. The more you know...
oOWallaceOo @ Oct 15th 2009 7:44AM
Don't touch the Butterfly, or it will effect something in someway. I can't remember what it's called, but I do know that Touching Butterflies = Apocolyptic Future
Michael T [Planeteer | Power of Mr. T] @ Oct 15th 2009 11:40AM
Uh, Wallace? The name of the effect you're looking for is the rather self-evident "Butterfly Effect."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect
Plastic Rat @ Oct 15th 2009 10:18PM
Thanks Michael T but I got distracted half way between copy-pasting that link to my browser.. could you summarize it for me? Use short simple sentences please.
JeezWhiz87 @ Oct 15th 2009 6:16AM
tl;dr
Blank-Mage @ Oct 15th 2009 6:20AM
I have windows open for Joystiq, Mangafox, Youtube, Facebook, and an episode of Kurogane no Linebarrels as I post this.
This doesn't mean anything! I swear!
zefur @ Oct 15th 2009 6:37AM
Mangafox seriously I only use that one if I reeeeaaaaaaaaally have to
And I usually have tabs open for
Hotmail, Facebook, Onemanga, Onemanga forums, Mangahelpers, Bakaupdates, Jcafe24, Joystiq, Sidereel, Icefilms, Cracked, Bmfleak, Hotnewhiphop
atleast I'm probably forgetting some cos I'm at work at the moment
sonicspike41 @ Oct 15th 2009 6:53AM
I'm playing Left 4 Dead as I type this...
OH SHIT, gotta go. TANK!
PedoJokerBear [Planeteer | Power of Gall Bladder] @ Oct 15th 2009 8:15AM
onemanga FTW
matias @ Oct 15th 2009 11:13AM
I usually do that, I surf on the internet or play solitaire or minesweeper while I read manga or watch anime. Or watch tv while I study or read.
I'm sure it's normal, right?
Pantsparty @ Oct 15th 2009 6:24AM
I can stay focused on video games pretty well...
I always have trouble getting to sleep after a 4-5 hour session though, I can't stop thinking about the game!
whylekat @ Oct 15th 2009 11:12AM
Haha that happens to me too. After a certain number of hours of game time... I'll close my eyes and just see the game replaying itself in my head. Especially with puzzle games.
Onced I played meteos for 3 hrs on a plane and when I tried to sleep for the rest of the flight, there was no darkness only zuel.. Errrr.. I mean only meteos blocks rocketing towards an alien planet.
Spartan [Planeteer | Power of Sunshine & Lollipops] @ Oct 15th 2009 6:25AM
The funny thing is I read the first sentence in the post then skipped to the last sentence and saw;
"but let's be honest: you didn't read the whole post, did you?"
LOL!
Justin W @ Oct 15th 2009 6:29AM
I think sonicspike said it best. Also, this is a generalized study and doesn't speak for everyone. I personally have no problem reading a book for a couple hours. I think the true issue is that none of the "scientists" either are or have been gamers. I personally think it's better to play a game vs. watching tv simply because you keep your brain active. You take the good with the bad I suppose.
zefur @ Oct 15th 2009 6:39AM
I on the other hand would prefer a good book over ANY game but since the second installment of the Kingkiller Chronicles (Name of the wind is the first book) aint out yet I guess I'll still be gaming for a while
zefur @ Oct 15th 2009 6:40AM
O I forgot to say I'm prepared to be downvoted for saying a good book is better then any game on a gaming website
pseth @ Oct 15th 2009 12:24PM
Actually, I'm a scientist who studies video games, and I'm a gamer. And a lot of my colleagues are gamers as well.
And yes it's a generalization, but it's still information and on average there is a relationship. It won't hold true for everyone, and without reading the study I myself have questions about the directionality of the relationship, but at the very least the results should encourage you to think about your own game playing habits and whether it is having an effect on your cognitive abilities (or other aspects of your behavior). It's very easy to just discount it all as hooey, but perhaps if you looked at your own behavior more actively you might notice that games are having an effect. They might not, but then again, you never know if you never actively look into it.
As for games training our abilities (as some have brought up here and elsewhere) there is very limited evidence that games (including games specifically marketed as "brain training") have any benefits on developing faster reaction time, better mental processes, etc. The effect only seems to occur for people who have deficits in those areas, rather than improving the abilities of average people. So one study found that the elderly, who often show declines in spatial abilities, can improve their spatial abilities by playing tetris. When the average person plays tetris, they get better at tetris, but not much else.
And one thing to keep in mind is that most scientist don't want to ban video games. Most scientist don't want to ban anything. Rather, they want to provide information that the public can use to make decisions about their own behavior. Yes, there are some scientists who have a personal mission, but most don't. I don't. I study video games and swearing, and most of my research shows that they are generally bad for people, but that doesn't lead me to lobby congress to ban people from swearing or playing video games. Rather, I use that information to change my own behavior, and I advise others to do the same. It's more the Jack Thompsons of the world who are trying to restrict your ability to do the things you love than scientists.
Darkpen @ Oct 15th 2009 7:01AM
Actually, I believe the study. I'm not surprised.