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Playing Action Video Games May Be Bad For Your Brain, Study Finds (www.cbc.ca)

Posted by msmash on from the what-science-says dept.

An anonymous reader shares a report:Playing first-person shooter video games causes some users to lose grey matter in a part of their brain associated with the memory of past events and experiences, a new study by two Montreal researchers concludes. Gregory West, an associate professor of psychology at the Universite de Montreal, says the neuroimaging study, published Tuesday in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, is the first to find conclusive evidence of grey matter loss in a key part of the brain as a direct result of computer interaction. "A few studies have been published that show video games could have a positive impact on the brain, namely positive associations between action video games, first-person shooter games, and visual attention and motor control skills," West told CBC News. To date, no one has shown that human-computer interactions could have negative impacts on the brain -- in this case the hippocampal memory system." The four-year study by West and Veronique Bohbot, an associate professor of psychiatry at McGill University, looked at the impact of action video games on the hippocampus, the part of the brain that plays a critical role in spatial memory and the ability to recollect past events and experiences.

116 comments

  1. Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    All things in moderation, it'll be just fine. Keep calm and frag on.

    1. Re: Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Well. Is it the gaming or the lack of sleep from staying up too late?

    2. Re: Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In all seriousness the study actually fingers FPS games only. Mainly CSGO. But you need to read between the lines too, basically the suggestion isn't that FPS games are bad for you, it's the playing exclusively FPS games for extensive periods of time (such as in MMO versions of FPS) is, and such you either need to take more breaks or play other kinds of games too, or play FPS games in moderation.

    3. Re: Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      All of you cats who think video games shouldn't be legal, well you're all fucked!

    4. Re: Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or the undisclosed weed habit?

    5. Re: Everything is bad for you. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exercise = Increased grey matter
      Mindfulness meditation = Increased grey matter

      You can always supplement videogames with other daily brain boosting activities as a hedge.

  2. Who has time for action video games by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 5, Funny

    What with all the porn, crystal meth, tv and politics we have to get through.

    1. Re:Who has time for action video games by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Politics?!? Are you serious, who has time for that? I have to get to CostCo before it closes, get to TGIFriday's before the All-You-Can-Eat-Appetizers special ends, and then log into Amazon for the Post-Prime Day Sales!

    2. Re:Who has time for action video games by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      Politics is entertainment these days. The orange dude Made America Laugh Again. His recent tweets about the "Vietnam vacation" almost made me crash laughing while listening to the news driving to work. (Let's just hope he doesn't break something important.)

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
    3. Re:Who has time for action video games by epyT-R · · Score: 1

      Pff who has time for all that porn, crystal meth, tv and politics when there's frags to rack up and gibs to liberate?

  3. As a professional video game tester... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 0

    No wonder my coworkers at Accolade/Infogrames/Atari (same company, different owners, multiple personality disorder) accused me of not being a team player when I got my certifications and went back to school to learn computer programming. I still had some grey matter left when I made my career transition to clean out IT closets.

    1. Re:As a professional video game tester... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Man that's messed up. Not a team player for working hard to better your career? I guess those that can't do, criticize.

    2. Re:As a professional video game tester... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Not a team player for working hard to better your career?

      The ugly fact about being a video game tester is that any other job pays better. Whenever someone complained about Sony paying $20/hr when we got $16/hr, management told us to get a job at the Taco Bell down the street. That is until a tester got a job at Taco Bell with better pay and benefits.

    3. Re:As a professional video game tester... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Without paying for certifications? Brilliant!

  4. So... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I guess that doing a lot of long distance driving or piloting has the same effect. For that matter, any job where you do the same task over and over again.

    1. Re:So... by cyberchondriac · · Score: 1

      That would explain my poor event memory, my drive to work isn't horrible by a lot of people's standards but I spend about an hour and a half every day driving to and from work (combined); and I've only ever played FPSes - Doom, Quake, Half-Life, FarCry, Skyrim, Deus Ex, Rage, Wolfenstein, etc.
      My wife remembers all kinds of things and details and I just barely remember being there. :-(

      --

      Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
    2. Re:So... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      My wife remembers all kinds of things and details and I just barely remember being there. :-(

      I have the same experience, but I have drastically more hours in Civ2 and AlphaC than I do in all FPSes put together. I can't remember the names of streets, but once I drive someplace I can drive there again — unless I got there by GPS navigation, in which case I wasn't really using the navigating part of my brain, and I'm going to need the GPS at least another time or two.

      On the other hand, some particular details stand out to me, and I remember them much later. I think the difference is really what you're thinking about. I tend to think about the stuff I'm talking about when I talk to people, and some people tend to think more about the people they're talking to. It's not that I don't value people, but part of what I value them for is high-quality discourse. But I do see it as a failing that I don't retain more about the people, who are at least as important as the topic of discussion.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    3. Re:So... by skids · · Score: 1

      Civ2 and AlphaC aren't games that are likely to build your spatial cognitive abilities. It's the maze-solving/navigation variety that do... and sandboxes with complicated maps, if you play them in an exploratively.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
  5. "May be bad" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "May", huh? Why even bother if you can't come to anything definitive? Everything "may" be bad for you under certain context.

    1. Re:"May be bad" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Violence is bad, even if it's virtual. Maybe they need to do a similar study on violent movies.

    2. Re:"May be bad" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Haven't you noticed, everything now is may or could. They are weasel words. They seem to convey meaning, but don't. It's allpart of the dumbing down of society.

  6. Witch hunt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Just another bogus study in a long line of anti-video game "studies".

    1. Re:Witch hunt by skids · · Score: 2

      Actually, it's just another sensationalist headline saying wrong things about a study that is really very interesting. I recommend RTFA.

      Twitch games build up one part of the brain and make the hippocampus atrophy. 3-D platformers (VR?) build up the hippocampus. The authors suggest FPS game makers take away the mini-maps and wayfinders and add more scenery and mazes to balance things out.

      Which makes me surprised that BL2 was to them a typical action game... the maps in that are usually best navigated by scenery and aren't linear or especially simple.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    2. Re:Witch hunt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Gotta stick to the narrative at all cost: video games are evil because violence, women not wearing burkas and too little approved social and political commentary.

    3. Re:Witch hunt by war4peace · · Score: 1

      People drink to forget, get high to forget and play games to forget.
      I guess from this point of view games work perfectly and meet the goals.

      --
      ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
  7. Bad or evolution? by dbrueck · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Grey matter loss seems bad, but at the same time I wonder if we're just detecting humans adapting to technology - maybe it's not so much a net loss in brain functionality but more a manifestation of tradeoffs being made.

    For example, growing up there was a lot of emphasis on memorizing information (memorize all the countries of the world, memorize all US states and their capitals, memorize these dates in history, memorize these mathematical equations, etc.). These days that seems far less useful.

    So, if we offload to technology the storage and recall of trivia, it wouldn't be surprising to find that some part of our brains are less used compared with those of people 50 years ago. But maybe we'd also see that the brains of people today are better at being exposed to more data without being overwhelmed, or better at quickly sifting through mounds of information to find something in particular, or better at distilling lots of info down to its essence.

    1. Re:Bad or evolution? by David_Hart · · Score: 5, Informative

      Grey matter loss seems bad, but at the same time I wonder if we're just detecting humans adapting to technology - maybe it's not so much a net loss in brain functionality but more a manifestation of tradeoffs being made.

      For example, growing up there was a lot of emphasis on memorizing information (memorize all the countries of the world, memorize all US states and their capitals, memorize these dates in history, memorize these mathematical equations, etc.). These days that seems far less useful.

      So, if we offload to technology the storage and recall of trivia, it wouldn't be surprising to find that some part of our brains are less used compared with those of people 50 years ago. But maybe we'd also see that the brains of people today are better at being exposed to more data without being overwhelmed, or better at quickly sifting through mounds of information to find something in particular, or better at distilling lots of info down to its essence.

      The study is more nuanced than that. It says that Response learners (people who count right and left turns) lose grey matter when playing FPS games for extended periods of time. But Spacial learners (those who use landmarks) seem not to be affected. I use spacial cues in FPS games because there is no way that I could remember left/right turns in games like Skyrim.

      The study also found that playing 3D platformers (i.e. Mario Brothers) reversed the grey matter loss.

    2. Re:Bad or evolution? by Narcocide · · Score: 2

      This is probably more on-point than conclusions that it's just outright brain damage. Lots of studies have shown there are tradeoffs for certain types of intellectual capacity. In one notable study they found that all chimpanzees have perfect photographic memories. The researchers hypothesized that human beings may have lost the ubiquity of this mental trait as a tradeoff for language processing capabilities.

    3. Re:Bad or evolution? by thebullshitpatrol · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I'm very suspicious when these types of claims are made without considering the tradeoff.

      I'm very much oriented towards rapid processing of information. On the contrary, I have a much more difficult time with memorization and procedural tasks than other people.

      The Richard Feynman archetype has existed forever, I think its just that now everyone who doesn't have that personality is being directed into it by the internet.

    4. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Grey matter loss seems bad, but at the same time I wonder if we're just detecting humans adapting to technology - maybe it's not so much a net loss in brain functionality but more a manifestation of tradeoffs being made.

      For example, growing up there was a lot of emphasis on memorizing information (memorize all the countries of the world, memorize all US states and their capitals, memorize these dates in history, memorize these mathematical equations, etc.). These days that seems far less useful.

      Absolutely correct! It's obvious that this kind of inf...

      Wait, what were we talking about, again?

    5. Re:Bad or evolution? by eagle52997 · · Score: 1

      Until you hear North Korea was threatening to attack Guam, and you're like "wtf are North Korea and Guam?" There is some level of information that is required to be a good citizen, and another level that is probably memorized based on your occupation and gets used often enough where knowing it saves you the time to look it up. Have you also seen the reports of how navigation tools are causing loss of spatial intelligence? Deity help us when the solar flares knock out electronics, or when NK attacks Guam and sets of other bombs around the world to cause a global EMP and loss of tech https://www.amazon.com/Dragon-...

    6. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I've supposedly lost memory of past events then why am I able to fire up the original DOOM or Duke Nukem 3D and remember where secret items are hidden in maps over 20 years from when I found them?

    7. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are people who count right and left turns? That hasn't even occurred to me as a viable strategy and now I feel stupid and ignorant of this.
      But I can see how modern games or simply modern technology like GPS are detrimental for people like that. In games you have radars, floating markers and mostly liner levels that show you the way you have to go. There's an ever decreasing need to analyse and or memorize how to navigate the 'map' or 'level' efficiently.

    8. Re: Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I wonder whether it isn't an evolved response, like the brain perceiving it as combat, and prioritizing survival over other more intellectual functions

    9. Re:Bad or evolution? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      For example, growing up there was a lot of emphasis on memorizing information (memorize all the countries of the world, memorize all US states and their capitals, memorize these dates in history, memorize these mathematical equations, etc.). These days that seems far less useful.

      Forced memorization of things you're not actually using was always stupid. When you actually use things repeatedly, you learn them plenty quickly.

      Memorizing equations is probably the exception, though. Knowing which equation to use when seems indispensable. You could figure it out if you're a badass mathematician, but why waste the time?

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    10. Re:Bad or evolution? by dbrueck · · Score: 1

      Yes and yes! This line of questions is something I've wondered about too and ... I don't know what the right answer is. :)

      On the one hand, memorizing gobs of factoids like I did in grade school seems like a waste. OTOH, without some set of hopefully-common knowledge, you can't really participate in society as well, much less avoiding repeating the mistakes of history. I found this article https://www.nytimes.com/intera... pretty fascinating, for example.

      For me personally I seem to do best if I'm aware of stuff on some level and then I can go read up on it if I want to know more, but I don't know what the right level of exposure is needed to give people at least in their formal education. But if I could redo my grade school education, especially things like social studies and history, I think I would have benefited from (and enjoyed) more focus on lessons and learnings from history, principles, and themes and far less focus on being able to say what exact year something happened.

      But on the flip side, knowing e.g. dates does matter some too - knowing that something happened right before the US Civil War can be relevant. Or knowing that it was as recent as the mid 1970's that women (at least in the US) had to have a man to co-sign for a bank loan can help in shaping perspective on certain types of progress.

    11. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I remember a very similar study comparing trial and error strategies and analytical strategies in video games. The former was also associated with a decrease of grey matter in the hippocampus if I remember correctly. I found it: http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/royprsb/282/1808/20142952.full.pdf and big surprise it shares an author (Gregory L. West).

    12. Re:Bad or evolution? by dbrueck · · Score: 1

      Agreed, although those too either remain with you if you use them or generally fade away if you don't use them regularly. I'm pretty sure the volume of a sphere is 4/3 * pi * r^3, but that's something I'd double check before relying on it since it's not something I use often. And it's been years since I've used the quadratic formula so I'd definitely have to Google that one. Those are really basic equations, and some people would be shocked that anyone doesn't just know them, while others would not even know what they are.

      We somehow need to make people aware of what's out there so that they can go dig in deeper if the need arises, but it's hard to know what is important enough to cover in the exercise of making people aware.

    13. Re:Bad or evolution? by aliquis · · Score: 1

      data without being overwhelmed, or better at quickly sifting through mounds of information to find something in particular, or better at distilling lots of info down to its essence.

      Yeah I'm excellent at ignoring everything to save energy ;D

    14. Re:Bad or evolution? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      There are people who count right and left turns? That hasn't even occurred to me as a viable strategy and now I feel stupid and ignorant of this.

      It's a classic strategy for traversing a maze or structure, but I for one have problems with numbers and I lose count, so I navigate by landmarks, colors, whatever is unique about the different areas. It really made the near-endgame of Halo horrible, I got turned around a bunch of times :)

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    15. Re:Bad or evolution? by Calydor · · Score: 1

      There was this dungeon crawler game back in the late 90s, early 2000. Mordor II, later Demise. Its map wasn't fluid but divided into squares, 45x45 I think, and then of course a ridiculous number of levels deep.

      By the time I grew bored of it, I was walking down to level 14 from the city just by remembering the number of keystrokes on the arrow keys. So yeah, it could be done - but I wouldn't really use it in any modern 3D game. Landmarks are the way to go - head under the outcrop and continue ahead to the three burned trees.

      --
      -=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
    16. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The classic strategy for traversing a classical maze (essentially a 2d maze without the chance of getting trapped) would to be either always turn left or always turn right. It's certainly not the most efficient way, but it has a very high success rate.

    17. Re:Bad or evolution? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Yes, that's very true. But how often do those come up in reality? Or even in a game, for that matter. Usually there's at least one tricky feature included to trip up that strategy. Except, of course, Halo. The only problem then is if you get turned around because of an extended firefight with the occasional surprise, and doorways. Do virtual doorways cause the same memory problems as real ones?

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    18. Re:Bad or evolution? by skids · · Score: 1

      Really to get a full workout, you need to be re-traversing the map so you come it the same room from different angles/perspectives. If you always respawn in the same place and run the same path to go get killed by the boss again and again, you'll regress into only exerting your response centers.

      So, nix on the spawn poles, too, or at least have a lot of eligible spawn points within range from which to randomly choose.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    19. Re:Bad or evolution? by skids · · Score: 1

      The most valuable thing you can teach is a taxonomy of what there is to learn, and the methods to learn it. But throwing some random data from some leaf nodes of that taxonomy can lead to a few "ah-ha I know this one" moments which will provide emotional motivation to put some flesh on those bones.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    20. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is fascinating, and might say something about how approaches to learning or training fit specific tasks better than others, but because of the way they're represented in abstract, mentally.

      Anecdotally, over the years i have taught many older people how to use computers... there is a common behaviour that many start with, which i always put down to the different types of mental tasks they'd grown up with, perhaps a prevalence of newspapers, etc: Writing lists of instructions, as if for static procedure.

      The user has a task in mind. They have an end goal in mind. They see the path from start to finish as a series of correct repeatable movements... This is not a productive way to think about an environment if you potentially have a different starting position every time you sit down. The lists would, inevitably, be missing an initial context, leaving the user looking back and forth between the screen and paper, trying to remember the context from which they started.

      I can't help but wonder whether training people to think about the environment differently would produce different long term physiological effects.

    21. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I may just never have encountered a scenario where I was a necessity to solve the problem.
      Maybe in a game like Simon and its variants? I remember a variant where the game was set up as an imaginary maze. The correct colour sequence was unknown to the player and each of the colours represented a direction the player could move into. Pushing the wrong button sent you into a 'wall' and put you back to the start. It would be interesting to know how that kind of game affects the learning in the brain. For example I can't remember if you could only move towards the end of the sequence or could also move back to your previous position :).

    22. Re:Bad or evolution? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's a classic strategy for traversing a maze or structure, but I for one have problems with numbers and I lose count, so I navigate by landmarks, colors, whatever is unique about the different areas.

      I'm terrible at both, so I usually navigate by GPS.
      (And in game settings, the equivalent minimap.)

    23. Re:Bad or evolution? by Gussington · · Score: 1

      I use spacial cues in FPS games because there is no way that I could remember left/right turns in games like Skyrim.

      The study also found that playing 3D platformers (i.e. Mario Brothers) reversed the grey matter loss.

      What did they say about CounterStrike? I play a fair bit and seem to have above average reaction, attention, motor skills etc, but also have terrible memory. To the GP's point, do I care? Figuring things out quickly is more important these days than remembering stuff, could this just but an evolutionary shift where strong memory becomes as useful as a tail?

  8. As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    AND designer
    You're full of shit.

    1. Re: As an actual video game engineer by alvinrod · · Score: 1

      Anyone who has a CS degree can probably call themselves a game designer. I made a Pong clone as part of an assembly class and I imagine most people have either done something similar or made a simple game as a hobby project. Thinking back I even made a crappy little text adventure game as a kid. Technically that was a game as well.

    2. Re:As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He's also full of himself. But I repeat myself.

    3. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure - we promoted many programmers out of playtesting at the various companies I worked at. It's a natural progression and, get this, they didn't need to get certification to do it, they picked up programming by themselves on the job and just demonstrated their version of "pong".
      Creimer's full of shit.

    4. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Creimer's full of shit.

      No, video game testing was a dead end job. I got my certifications (A+/Network+/Windows) and learned computer programming to get out of the video game industry.

    5. Re: As an actual video game engineer by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Clicking the Amazon Associates stripe to get an affiliate link to spam on Slashdot doesn't count as "computer programming".

    6. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, video game testing was a dead end job. I got my certifications (A+/Network+/Windows) and learned computer programming to get out of the video game industry.

      Not like cleaning closets. That's a job with limitless career growth.

    7. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Clicking the Amazon Associates stripe to get an affiliate link to spam on Slashdot doesn't count as "computer programming".

      Thank God that I'm not a professional programmer by trade then.

    8. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Not like cleaning closets. That's a job with limitless career growth.

      I seriously don't understand your obsession about IT closets. I cleaned up a few in my 20+ year tech career and that's all you harped about.

    9. Re:As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      He's also full of himself. But I repeat myself.

      I heard those complaints when I went I got my certifications and went back to school. Seems like anyone who tries to better himself is "full of himself" and not "a team player". No wonder this country is screwed up.

    10. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I seriously don't understand your obsession about IT closets. I cleaned up a few in my 20+ year tech career and that's all you harped about.

      Mostly you get shit about it, because you cite it as evidence of your "miracle worker" status - as if getting paid an IT salary for doing low value work that is best accomplished by facilities and maintenance staff is somehow an accomplishment worthy of note.

      You've brought it up repeatedly in the context of justifying your "miracle worker" claim. If you don't think it's important or relevant, why do YOU bring it up?

    11. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, just you you fat fuck.

    12. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

      Mostly you get shit about it, because you cite it as evidence of your "miracle worker" status - as if getting paid an IT salary for doing low value work that is best accomplished by facilities and maintenance staff is somehow an accomplishment worthy of note.

      These are IT closets that facilities refuses to clean up. Mostly because they don't want the electronic waste disposal fees charged to their budget. When I worked at a local hospital, it took three weeks for management to figure who was going to pay for three 40-yard dumpsters to throw out the packing materials (foam and cardboard) for 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors.

      If you don't think it's important or relevant, why do YOU bring it up?

      Because it pisses off my trolls.

    13. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I seriously don't understand your obsession about IT closets. I cleaned up a few in my 20+ year tech career and that's all you harped about.

      Mostly you get shit about it, because you cite it as evidence of your "miracle worker" status - as if getting paid an IT salary for doing low value work that is best accomplished by facilities and maintenance staff is somehow an accomplishment worthy of note.

      Considering the area where he works and lives the facilities and maintenance staff might make more than he does since he works for peanuts compared to most IT salaries.

    14. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      No, just you you fat fuck.

      I'm afraid not. I've seen this quite frequently with other people. Whenever someone tries to better themselves or promote their personal brand, critics (trolls) are always ready to tear them down.

    15. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These are IT closets that facilities refuses to clean up.

      If it was important, it would have happened. Even if the IT manager asked, a refusal from facilities is simply a prompt to begin again, one level higher. At some point, if the organization judges it worth the expense, the closet will be cleaned out. In the meantime, you wasted money, time, and skills better spent on other tasks to clean something that literally nobody in the organization felt was a priority to fund or budget.

      Mostly because they don't want the electronic waste disposal fees charged to their budget. When I worked at a local hospital, it took three weeks for management to figure who was going to pay for three 40-yard dumpsters to throw out the packing materials (foam and cardboard) for 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors.

      Oh wow, imagine the accolades for miracle work if you had just taken it upon yourself to take all those boxes & foam home and dispose of them in your apartment complex's dumpster! That management doesn't get their shit together on budgetary issues isn't really the problem of a low level ticket dispatcher. If they want you working on things that are of higher importance, it's not within your purview to override that decision.

    16. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      [...] you wasted money, time, and skills better spent on other tasks to clean something that literally nobody in the organization felt was a priority to fund or budget.

      Until the fire marshal shows up. Then it becomes a priority. Having boxes stacked to the ceiling and blocking sprinklers is a no-no.

      That management doesn't get their shit together on budgetary issues isn't really the problem of a low level ticket dispatcher

      You must not work in a large corporation then. These bureaucratic battles are quite common. Also, I was the technician responsible for unboxing, imagining and deploying 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors. I wasn't dispatching tickets.

    17. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Until the fire marshal shows up.

      And when the fire marshal shows up, then management will prioritize it, and suddenly when faced with a $10,000 fine for fire code infringements, or a $5,000 charge for e-waste disposal, the facilities department will suddenly find that it's part of their charter to clean up the closet. YOU are not the fire marshal. Nor are YOU the person who has to pay the fine if management decides they want to eat the cost of the fine.

      You must not work in a large corporation then. These bureaucratic battles are quite common.

      I have, and I'm well aware that political battles are common. However, that doesn't make them YOUR problem to resolve.

      Also, I was the technician responsible for unboxing, imagining and deploying 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors. I wasn't dispatching tickets.

      So what? The disposal of the waste wasn't your issue, if your management team didn't get you the appropriate place to put the garbage. Seriously, if nobody else has a problem with a filled up closet, why are you going to waste time on it? Do you also run around the office scrubbing people's whiteboards clean because "this is old stuff that was written months ago, and people need clean whiteboards!"??? It's fucking stupid.

    18. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      And when the fire marshal shows up, then management will prioritize it, and suddenly when faced with a $10,000 fine for fire code infringements, or a $5,000 charge for e-waste disposal, the facilities department will suddenly find that it's part of their charter to clean up the closet.

      Not at the companies I've worked at. Facilities doesn't do squat. If the IT department gets cited by the fire marshal, it comes out of the IT budget.

      It's fucking stupid.

      That's why contractors are hired to do all the "fucking stupid" jobs that full-time people don't want to touch. This is why I enjoy working as a contractor. Every job is completely different.

    19. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not at the companies I've worked at. Facilities doesn't do squat. If the IT department gets cited by the fire marshal, it comes out of the IT budget.

      And you still haven't offered a coherent rationale for why that's your problem. You are a contractor - you're paid to be an IT support drone, not to function as a highly-paid broom pusher. If IT gets fined, why do you care? If facilities doesn't do anything, why do you care? Pile the empty boxes in a hallway and tell your boss, "I can't do anything about it until you get a me a dumpster."

      That's why contractors are hired to do all the "fucking stupid" jobs that full-time people don't want to touch.

      It's not "don't want to touch" -- it's "can't be bothered because it's not a priority and nobody cares if it gets done." And by that measure, you are wasting your employer's money and time doing work that is not a priority.

      This is why I enjoy working as a contractor. Every job is completely different.

      Plus, you never have to do anything useful - you can just clean closets and take boxes out to the dumpster.

    20. Re: As an actual video game engineer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      janteloven

    21. Re: As an actual video game engineer by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      If facilities doesn't do anything, why do you care?

      Because I needed space for the next shipment of Dell PCs from China.

      Pile the empty boxes in a hallway and tell your boss, "I can't do anything about it until you get a me a dumpster."

      You don't put packing material out into the hallway of a hospital. The IT manager's response: "Go talk to facilities."

      Plus, you never have to do anything useful - you can just clean closets and take boxes out to the dumpster.

      Don't forget the 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors for deployment, the 750 PCs and 1,500 monitors for disposal, and a ton of old PC hardware pulled from the floors that looked like they were being used but no one was using them.

  9. Misleading title by Marcpek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As usual, news sites like make catchy titles on scientific articles while ignoring important information. From the abstract: "These results show that video games can be beneficial or detrimental to the hippocampal system depending on the navigation strategy that a person employs and the genre of the game." So that doesn't mean that playing video games shrinks your brain, does it.

    1. Re:Misleading title by nasch · · Score: 1

      Playing Action Video Games May Be Bad For Your Brain, Study Finds

      Playing first-person shooter video games causes some users to lose grey matter

      The qualifiers are right there. You're the one who paraphrased incorrectly.

  10. And next week it will be..... by Zorro · · Score: 2

    Playing Action Video Games May Be GOOD For Your Brain, Study Finds..... Click bait!

  11. Have fun and eliminate cringe-memories? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Win-win!

  12. Kotaku-in-Action by PopeRatzo · · Score: 1

    Most of us already knew playing action video games was bad for your brain.

    Remember #gamergate?

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
    1. Re:Kotaku-in-Action by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You mean the thing where video game journalists ran a concerted campaign against their audience because they dared point out the journos' corruption?

      Funny enough, these days it's less religious prudes and regressive conservatives who claim video games are evil. It's progressive liberals, well self-proclaimed anyway.

    2. Re: Kotaku-in-Action by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You mean the thing where a bunch of women hating basement dwellers tried everything possible to get women who dare criticize or work in video games fired or killed?

    3. Re: Kotaku-in-Action by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The people who make threats and get others fired are the social justice outrage mob. It's always the same. The latest incarnations are for example that Drupal dev and the one at Google.

      Pretty much all this "Misogyny! Gamers are evil and over!" crap came from a tightknit clique of journalists (who circled their wagons when people looked too closely at their practices, like writing favorable reviews for friends, getting compensated for reviews or pushing political narratives) and professional victims who literally made a career out of crying "-ism!".

    4. Re: Kotaku-in-Action by goose-incarnated · · Score: 1

      You mean the thing where a bunch of women hating basement dwellers tried everything possible to get women who dare criticize or work in video games fired or killed?

      Ironically, reading the thread over here and over here shows that the biggest supporters of firing critics are, in fact, the ones who were the biggest supporters of the games journos.

      This whole google-firing scandal is rich in irony - I'm waiting to hear those same supporters whine about the silencing effect of the government when google gets slapped with a fine for illegally firing someone (AKA silencing the dissenting opinions). There is literally no way out of this that does not reveal all the "feminists" to be intellectual midgets.

      --
      I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
  13. Bad news for all the manbaby cucklets out there by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Video games are pathetic.

    1. Re:Bad news for all the manbaby cucklets out there by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sorry, Slashdot posted before I was finished. What I meant to say is that video games are pathetic, you should play hairdressers with your barbie dolls like I do.

  14. Study actually looks at navigation strategies used by celest · · Score: 3, Informative

    Actual study (open access): http://www.nature.com/mp/journ...

    The actual study looks at the navigation strategies used in games and separates both the type of games and the type of players; i.e., players of the same game using different navigation strategies develop their brains differently.

    The finding is that if you play first person shooters and just wander around and shoot things, the hippocampus doesn't develop (and decreases in mass). By contrast, if you learn to navigate based on references in the game (or, by dying repeatedly by navigating incorrectly, as is common in the Mario game control group they used) your brain develops.

    It would be interesting to see a comparison between Call of Duty pub players and competitive Counter-Strike players. The former just "shoot everything that moves". The latter are highly coordinated like SWAT teams. The present findings seem to suggest that the latter--in the same game--would develop their brain matter, whereas the former would not.

  15. All things in moderation by Tablizer · · Score: 0

    A general rule of life is "all things in moderation". If you do too much of ANYTHING, it usually causes problems or risk. Too much exercise, such as running or weight lifting, even appears to be detrimental. If you spend most of your free time gaming, you are probably screwing yourself over. Same applies to coffee, alcohol, porn, trolling slashdot, you name it. Mix it up, get out more. (Yes, I am pulling a Shatner skit here. Deal with it.)

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
    1. Re:All things in moderation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...including moderation.

    2. Re:All things in moderation by Tablizer · · Score: 1

      You must be a software tester.

      --
      Table-ized A.I.
  16. You mean to tell me... by glenebob · · Score: 1

    that if you use your brain in a narrow way for a large portion of your life, that your brain will become less good at the things you don't use it for?

    Here comes my shocked face again.

    1. Re: You mean to tell me... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Does it look like this 'o'

      Because mine does. ;)

  17. Small wonder by nospam007 · · Score: 1

    "Playing first-person shooter video games causes some users to lose grey matter"

    My character has his brains flying around all the time in the games I play.

  18. Isn't the lesson here... by RyanFenton · · Score: 1

    First up, link to the actual study in Nature's Molecular Psychology:

    Impact of video games on plasticity of the hippocampus

    The study was mostly on the effects of different navigation mechanisms (the "control group" did 3d platforming) - so isn't the lesson here, if you spend lots of time gaming, don't only play one kind of game?

    Also, where was the non-videogaming control? Isn't there a general loss of grey matter over time regardless? I'd think tablet/GPS users using virtually NO navigational skills would also see a reduction in hippocampus grey matter over time - and most archived studies wouldn't have taken into account newer commonly used technologies reducing general navigation.

    Nice data point - as the paper states and strongly implies, more study is needed, and the conclusions that can be drawn here are quite limited.

    Ryan Fenton

    1. Re:Isn't the lesson here... by tranZent · · Score: 1

      A good summary of the study, by a neurologist: https://sciencebasedmedicine.o...

    2. Re:Isn't the lesson here... by RyanFenton · · Score: 1

      Cool - really like Dr Steven Novella's take on this - I listen to the Skeptics Guide podcast on occasion when I can.

      Ryan Fenton

  19. Media cycle by DrYak · · Score: 2

    In other words :

    Article "Doing activity X will improve training on capability A and B, but the unused skill C and D will dwindle"
    Press "OMG! X is going to kill us all because of C and D ! Quick, click on our advertisement!"

    Cue in ob. reference to PhDcomics

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  20. My Brain Hutrs... by newbie_fantod · · Score: 1

    The game may only be a simulation, but the PTSD is real.

    1. Re:My Brain Hutrs... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 1

      Well, it'll have to come out!

  21. Did they account for pot use? by the_skywise · · Score: 1

    We therefore followed up Study 1 with two longitudinal training studies where participants trained in-lab for 90h on either an action or 3D-platform video game (Study 2) or on an action-role playing game

    How many players of Call of Duty were habitual pot users vs the players of My Little Pony Sparkle Adventures?

    Wait... don't answer that...

  22. Oh no! We are DOOMed! by jmcwork · · Score: 2

    I Quake with fear that the loss of grey matter could resulting in me leading a Half-Life. (OK, I got you started, do not disappoint me.)

  23. Fight or Flight Reaction, Maybe? by Neuronwelder · · Score: 1

    Maybe they are counting the fight or flight reaction. Being overstressed is known to kill brain cells.

  24. Well .... by DaMattster · · Score: 1

    You can die crossing the street. You can loose grey matter in your brain from concussion or other injury. This study is rubbish ... it is a waste of time and resources.

  25. GAMES ARE FOR 1D10TS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    games...
    made by idi0ts
    sold by id1ots
    played by 1diots

    from freecell to skyrimjob, all so fvcking BORING that you have to be an id1ot stoner to get beyond the banality

    FVCK YOU ALL

  26. This bothers me... by GameboyRMH · · Score: 1

    This bothers me because I have good visual attention and motor control skills but poor memory and...well, look at my username...

    Maybe the puzzle games would help to compensate for the FPS damage? :-P

    --
    "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
  27. I thought I read where gaming was good? by p51d007 · · Score: 1

    Wasn't it within the past 6 months, there was a "study" that stated playing FPS was good for the brain?

  28. Adjust Data For Krunk? by ponfgong-e · · Score: 1

    Did their data adjust for the percentage of gamers who were pounding keystone light while racking up frags? frags is still gamer lingo right? I don't know anymore I'm old and I lost too much gray matter on CS in my youth.

  29. One study? And no methodology given. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    TFA gives no data. Show me some replication studies, sample size, and methodology and we can talk. Otherwise this is just another "Coffee is good/bad for you!" ones that litter newspages.

  30. Here by XSportSeeker · · Score: 1

    https://www.nature.com/mp/jour...

    Forget short hand summaries and the articles you are gonna read about this subject that are often misguided and sensationalistic.
    Read the piece. It has some merit, but it might not be drawing the conclusions that people are writing about it.

    1. Re:Here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Good link. I'll summarize in plain language for anyone who bothers to read this:

      First-person shooters may be good, or bad, for your hippocampus. Players who use non-spatial navigation strategies when playing games may show reduced grey matter in their hippocampus (which is involved with, among other things, navigation and spatial reasoning.) Players who use a hippocampus-based spatial reasoning strategy for navigating, show increased growth in their hippocampus.

      So, if you play an FPS game by primarily wandering around looking for something to shoot without thinking much, this might be detrimental to your overall navigation and spatial reasoning ability -- even if you're a good twitchy player who can shoot accurately and quickly. If you play an FPS game by thinking about where you're going to go, then going there (requiring you to have a mental map which updates your position inside your head) this is good for your overall navigation and spatial reasoning ability.

      I wonder how the presence or absence, and ease of use, of mini-maps and in-game navigation aids modulates this function.

  31. not too long ago by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It was good, now its bad... in a year its good again

  32. Reading articles like this and believing is worse by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A friend of mine's mom was one of the early researchers for this crap. Then, I go to college for Clinical Research and Psychology, and in all that time trying to be young and prove things, having unlimited access to most research journals (and still due; perks of graduating), I can assure you that this is just baiting. There is just as much evidence for as there is against and both fail miserably with confounding variables because most of the studies are done by students or paid by game companies.

  33. Can't Be True by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If this were true, then every Call of Duty player would be a brain-dead idiot who just randomly screamed at everyone for no apparent rea.... wait.... as you were.

  34. Use it or loose it? by tomxor · · Score: 1

    Does the study actually show computer game specific negative effects? or is this another "do this to excess and the negatives outweighs the benefits" type of observation which applies to basically everything, (yes i'm sceptical... i'm also lazy/busy/not interested enough, someone read the study and give us the TL;DR of the truth of the article premise.)

  35. And TV... by Torp · · Score: 1

    ... makes your whole brain shrink, right?

    --
    I apologize for the lack of a signature.
  36. As with anything... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    it's about quantity.

  37. Quake 3 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... the part of the brain that plays a critical role in spatial memory and the ability ...

    I always thought 'Mechwarrior 2' was awful because weapons management was so detailed; the only complicated variable in the game. I noticed that 'Quake 3 arena' was different to other FPS games. Other people talked about the detailed eye-candy. I noticed the point of the game was 'grab the biggest gun and kill everything'. Maps tended to be circular with few dead-ends: No need to memorize directions/landmarks. Other thoughts like determining choke points, advance and hide way-points, or maximizing power-up usage, weren't needed.

  38. Video Games Don't Affect Kids. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    “If Pac-Man had affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in dark rooms, munching pills and listening to repetitive electronic music.”

    - Marcus Brigstocke

  39. Articles take the lazy approach by sarbonn · · Score: 1

    Part of the problem with this study is the bad interpretations of the study after the study was concluded (and this was done by the click bait articles about it rather than the scientist journal that described it). If their conclusions are significant (and more studies, specifically case studies, are needed to determine just that), what they have found is that repetitive actions in a game long term is problematic, but long term playing of the game is not the causal mechanism itself. Because what they found was that doing the same thing over and over again over long periods is what causes the negative ramifications. So, a fps player would have to play the same sequences over and over again in order to achieve this mundane existence that causes the loss. Playing a game over a long period of time would allow the player to interact with continuously changing environments (not doing the same exact thing over and over again), whereas their study focuses more on doing the same activities extensively (which they term "autopilot" mode). So, a repetitive game would be bad; a fps involving exploring would probably be a lot better.

    --
    Sarbonn's blog: http://www.sarbonn.com/blog