Brain Training is snake oil

[Kire]

I have a friend who just got his doctorate in Psychology at U of I that was doing a study about what games effect people's brains and everyday performances for better or worse. The shocking part is that brain training games had absolutely no effect on people's lives according to the data they collected and all the people they observed.

The shocker? Guess what kind of game benefitted people the most? First Person Shooters. They saw a marginal increase in reaction time and spacial decision making after having played the FPS's. I don't have all the details but I'm sure the study will be made public soon.

He has no interest in video games, so he doesn't have a bias. I just found this kinda reassurring since I owned the game myself for a month and really found no effects of it in my practical life. I kept playing it because I thoght it would benefit me in some way.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: Brain Training is snake oil

I was always under the assumption that it was just a time-waster, like any other game of intelligence.

[DarkwingChuck]

Re: Brain Training is snake oil

I still want to get Brain Age but only because it has the best Sudoku interface I know of. I played the demo from a Download Station and everything other than the Sudoku just got on my nerves. I know there have been a few other Sudoku specific games on DS but none implemented as well.

[gray]

Re: Brain Training is snake oil

i have a friend who's been a geek his entire life, and he refutes your friend, saying brain training is, in fact, a video game.

[Red Dragon]

Re: Brain Training is snake oil

I still, to this day, have no idea of my times table.

[Crimson Knight]

Re: Brain Training is snake oil

All I'm gonna say is, RPG Maker 2 helped me develop better games on other programs that require more complex scripting, by increasing my math and problem solving skills.

You also have to take into account that the experiment was a study.