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Tetris May Reduce PTSD, But Pub Quiz Makes It Worse
Last year we discussed news that researchers from Oxford University discovered playing Tetris after watching a disturbing film reduced the amount of intrusive flashbacks experienced by test subjects. The researchers then wondered if that was true for other games, so they began a new study, the results of which were just published in the journal PLoS ONE. Reader SpuriousLogic points out that while they repeated their earlier finding about Tetris, they also found that subjects who played trivia game Pub Quiz instead reported more flashbacks.
"Research tells us that there is a period of up to six hours after the trauma in which it is possible to interfere with the way that these traumatic memories are formed in the mind. During this time-frame, certain tasks can compete with the same brain channels that are needed to form the memory. This is because there are limits to our abilities in each channel: for example, it is difficult to hold a conversation while doing math problems. The Oxford team reasoned that recognizing the shapes and moving the colored building blocks around in Tetris competes with the images of trauma in the perceptual information channel. Consequently, the images of trauma (the flashbacks) are reduced. The team believe that this is not a simple case of distracting the mind with a computer game, as answering general knowledge questions in the Pub Quiz game increased flashbacks. The researchers believe that this verbal based game competes with remembering the contextual meaning of the trauma, so the visual memories in the perceptual channel are reinforced and the flashbacks are increased."
In other news, subjects that played Daikatana reduced the flashbacks completely--because the subjects dropped dead.
This is WHY the Soviets tasked Pajitnov with creating Tetris in the first place. They saw addicting games as a means to destroy American productivity.
Considering the zombification WoW, Farmville, etc. currently inflict upon our nation, I'd say they were right. Indeed, Tetris on the Gameboy had the same effect. And still does. Over 100,000,000 copies of Tetris have been sold. For cell phones alone.
This is not so surprising. If you've ever played Tetris for any amount of time, you'll know that for hours afterward you'll have flashbacks of falling shapes. That leaves no time for traumatic flashbacks.
acid is not practicable. Never mind the pub quiz.
Every end has half a stick.
Wouldn't learning to cope with it be the better alternative, as opposed to using the brain's magical hardware to numb it away?
All things being equal, I am glad I learned how to cope with shock. Goatse? 2G1C? 1Guy1Jar? BME? I feel like I am better off handing them as opposed to trying to dull my memories of them with (admittedly interesting) brain tricks.
The tragedy of the situation is, duke nukem cures cancer... but no one will ever benefit from that. :(
check out the Mp3 Garbler I built!
It stands to reason that if "Tetris competes with the images of trauma in the perceptual information channel" then Tetris would also compete with the images of pron in the perceptual information channel.
Note to self; stop playing Tetris whilst viewing Intertube pr0ns.
This is the NSA, we're gonna geet U h@x0r5! Also, what is a h@x0r5?
This is a very interesting idea. I gather that the next question to ask is what aspects of tetris and popquiz produce the effects they do?
I'm guessing that it has to do with tetris having no real life context (you're pushing around sets of coloured squares, which would not really apply to anyone except maybe traumatized bricklayers), while popquiz requires you to actively think about and recall real life events and concepts.
Which would suggest that other games (video or otherwise) that don't mimic real life concepts would provide a similar effect.
After watching "Linda Lovelace Meets Rin-Tin-Tin" in the '70s, I have been unable to play Tetris!
Why, without your clothes, you're naked, Miss Dudley!
Trauma victims should surf around 4chan for a few months. That would pretty much cure them from any mental trauma that they have encountered.
Many people may not realize that many vets drink alcohol to get longer periods of REM sleep, so playing Pub Quiz may not be good for you, but if it also involves drinking alcohol, the negative effects (flashbacks) may be outweighed by the positive effects (more sleep).
The best solution, of course, is to play the version of Tetris in Monty Python's computer game based on King Arthur, where you fill a pit with decomposing plague-ridden corpses.
This is both funny and will usually lead to the consumption of alcohol.
Mind you, creatine is cheaper than alcohol and has fewer side effects and gives you longer sleep periods, so maybe playing Tetris while having creatine may be the optimal solution.
Even if it won't be half as fun.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Pub Quiz is cause for PTSD. There are good games, bad games, and the games that keep you up at night shivering in terror and endless questions of why, why WHY didn't I answer d? I knew that question, I knew it. It should have been obvious. The horror, THE HORROR. If only I hadn't picked c. I was just careless. It shouldn't have mattered. But it all came down to that one question. Why dear god why!?
but playing tetris on acid is not practicable.
It looks like someone needs to try Lockjaw: The Overdose. See also video
Duke Nukem Forever will cure all illnesses. You ever wondered why it's not out yet? It's because of the pharma industry is concerned about their profit.
No, they're just being careful. A lab accident could lead to something like the Concentration Room incident.
I think this guy would disagree about Tetris reducing PTSD.
Keeping soldiers busy has been practiced forever in most if not all military forces. There are several very good reasons to do that, and one of them is to prevent soldiers from dwelling on the horrors of war.
If it's just shapes and stimulus and so on, perhaps having them just sit in a room with videos of Tiesto or Daft Punk or similar playing would probably saturate their brains to the point of remembering nothing at all.
On a side note, I still remember going to see the Blue Man Group three months ago more vividly than my ex's face. So I know it really can work. ;)
Tetris? I 'discovered' Cave Story the other day and all I see when I close my eyes now is sand traps, flying critters and cute talking bunnies. The music is also catchy.
You can send me to a thousand Iraqs and I wouldn't remember any of it. PTSD? Meh - Bring it on!
I'm an armchair psychologist, but I think it's more that Tetris is a game where the player is in control of every aspect of the game and the rules are clear. This is a confidence building, esteem building exercise. The latter depends on your knowledge of trivia ... requires you to have recall from dozens of years of random factoids, and even if you do this you are still competing against other people that you can't control. This makes them very uneasy and anxious even if they're doing well.
my $0.02
... the long-term process of repairing and strengthening the mind is the real way to go, I would think.
The process isn't nearly as long-term as it used to be.
Practitioners of Energy Psychology have been trying to get someone in the DOD to listen to them for the last 15 years. Earlier this year two psychologists visited congress with a soldier they cured of PTSD. All hope seemed lost, but then lady luck appeared and made some connections for them.
They say that Walter Reed is now doing a formal study of the Emotional Freedom Technique on soldiers with PTSD.
Truth-out recently featured a nice article calling on the American Psychological Association to end its ban on Energy Psychology. And Feinstein now has two papers scheduled for publication in some entirely mainstream psychology journals.
You're quite right about avoiding PTSD by not signing up, but Energy Psychology is the best way to fix the people who come home broken.
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
Nigger, because plantation owners can't pronounce negro. Probably due to hair lip's and other deformations resulting from inbreeding.
I would guess any activity in which people zone out - such as playing Bejeweled, or cooking or driving a car - would reduce the PTSD