Video games help develop attention and sensorimotor skills — study

The next time someone tells you video games are for children, tell them that you’re just exercising your brain to keep it in shape.

 

A study published in the journal Scientific Reports explains that playing action video games (AVGs) helps develop attention and sensorimotor skills. Researchers found that expert AVG players had better connections and more gray matter volume in the parts of the brain containing attention and sensorimotor networks.

 

The researchers used functional MRI to look at the brains of 27 expert AVG players and compared them to the brains of 30 amateur AVG players.

A comparison of an amateur gamer's brain (left column) versus an expert gamer's brain (right column). Experts showed higher attention (change in color from green to yellow in top row) and more parts of the brain activated for sensorimotor work (encirled area in lower row). 
 

Add this to previous findings that show how video games can help develop learning skills and you have a pretty good argument in favor of spending more time blowing up enemy bases and punching enemy baddies in the throat. 

Just don’t spend too much time playing—a study from Oxford found that too much time playing might lead to behavioral problems. — Bea Montenegro/TJD, GMA News