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Videogaming Keeps the Brain From Aging
Ant wrote to mention a Globe and Mail article stating that videogames keep the mind young and help in quick focusing on different tasks. "A body of research suggests that playing video games provides benefits similar to bilingualism in exercising the mind. Just as people fluent in two languages learn to suppress one language while speaking the other, so too are gamers adept at shutting out distractions to swiftly switch attention between different tasks. A new study of 100 university undergraduates in Toronto has found that video gamers consistently outperform their non-playing peers in a series of tricky mental tests. If they also happened to be bilingual, they were unbeatable."
the European arrogance cancels out the bonus they get on the multilingual (of course I'm sure they say the arrogance of us cancels out our better work ethic -lol) and maybe it does? one of not to many americans travel abroad and I think that hurts us
Well, I'm a Central European, and I speak english (at 14), even though I was never taught to. I learned it by myself from using the Internet. When I became fluent enough, I started watching movies and TV shows purely in english, without any subtitles, which really improved my recognition of spoken english words. I have been trying to learn German this way, and it seems it's a lot harder when you actually want to learn it.
And yes, I do consider the average american to be stupid, and I have every reason to do so. The fact that Bush is still president in america is a very good reason, for example, along with the fact that the average american thinks america is the only place on the planet. That said, I do know plenty of intelligent americans, and fortunately I usually manage to avoid the stupid ones on the internet.
[SHOW SOME LENIENCY TOWARDS
If someone who speaks three languages is called trilingual, and someone who speaks two languages bilingual, what do you call someone who only speaks one language? American!
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die