Playing video games as a child helps you perform better at working memory tasks as an adult. New research by the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) shows how cognitive changes in the brain can occur if the once avid gamers start playing again years later. Several other studies have shown how gaming can lead to structural changes in the brain, including activating the areas responsible for visual-spatial skills or attention and even increasing brain regions’ size.
The new study aimed to understand the long-term effects. It found that non-gamers were slower and didn’t perform as well in working memory tasks as people who were avid gamers during childhood, even if they no longer played.
Ph.D. researcher Marc Palaus said:
People who were avid gamers before adolescence, despite no longer playing, performed better with the working memory tasks, which require mentally holding and manipulating information to get a result.
Likewise, people who played regularly as children performed better from the outset in processing 3D objects, although these differences were mitigated after the period of training in video gaming when both groups showed similar levels.
The Study
- Twenty-seven people – with and without any gaming experience – between 18 and 40 years old participated.
- The study required that the participants play Nintendo’s Super Mario 64 for one month.
- The researchers analyzed the players’ cognitive skills, including working memory, before the gaming training began, at the end of the month, and fifteen days later.
- The participants also had to do ten sessions of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) throughout the month of gaming. TMS is a non-invasive brain stimulation that temporarily changes the brain’s activity. The researchers wanted to see if combining TMS with gaming would improve cognitive performance.
Palaus said:
It uses magnetic waves which, when applied to the surface of the skull, can produce electrical currents in underlying neural populations and modify their activity.
We aimed to achieve lasting changes. Under normal circumstances, the effects of this stimulation can last from milliseconds to tens of minutes. We wanted to achieve improved performance of certain brain functions that lasted longer than this.
The Results
- There were no improvements in processing and inhibiting irrelevant stimuli for those without gaming experience as a child.
- The participants who were avid gamers during childhood performed better at working memory tasks.
- The TMS didn’t do anything to improve cognitive performance.
Conclusion
All video games gradually get more demanding and present a constant challenge; that is how they engage the brain. There are many genres, each influencing cognitive functions differently.
Palaus said:
These two things are enough to make it an attractive and motivating activity, which, in turn, requires constant and intense use of our brain’s resources. Video games are a perfect recipe for strengthening our cognitive skills, almost without our noticing.
However, the improvements are limited regarding the performance of non-gaming activities. So, while its good exercise to keep your mind active, gaming probably isn’t going to make you a genius.
