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Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

nida.nih.gov

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Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#251

Post by tralarpa »

carabiner wrote: post #248

I didn't learn anything from hours of Counter-strike, half-life, flight sims (ok this taught me some aviation trivia) as a teenager. I deeply regret these hours, as I could have spent them outdoors hiking, rock climbing, running. Maybe even talking to girls and building better social skills.

I thought the same about my passion for Lego-style construction toys. Then, as a 25-year-old, I had to build something out of cardboard with people about the same age. It was really surprising to see that they had no intuitive understanding at all of trivial things like "which side do I start from" or "this thing is wobbling and needs a little reinforcement at the corner" (I am not talking about "complicated" things like gears and robots etc.). So, who knows what you learned from those games?

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#253

Post by lillecarl »

lucasfcosta wrote: post #221

I'll add the classic comment here: "correlation does not mean causation". Maybe it's the kids with better cognitive performance that like videogame better. I wouldn't find that unlikely considering it's more mentally stimulating than other "real-world" activities. Also, I personally learned to code by writing bots for an MMORPG, so I definitely owe my career to videogames.

I owe my career to World of Warcraft. Started running my own server in 2008 when the burning crusade was released on my ADSL connection for friends, then I started "scripting" shit in C++ (server software is a good framework (CMaNGOS)), so while it was compiled in it wasn't really like writing C++, never had to think about ownership, threading, lifetimes etc...

Eventually I stared messing about more inside the framework, now I work as an SRE for a streaming service. Never pursued software development as I thought I was too stupid, and now pay would be too shite as a junior dev :)

In a sense Blizzard entertainment just happened to "save my life" (I'm certain I would have a dogshit life without this, many reasons).

I think more games should embrace modding like Blizzard games do/did with maps, workshops (while not being minecraft).

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#254

Post by dpatterbee »

lucasfcosta wrote: post #221

I'll add the classic comment here: "correlation does not mean causation". Maybe it's the kids with better cognitive performance that like videogame better. I wouldn't find that unlikely considering it's more mentally stimulating than other "real-world" activities. Also, I personally learned to code by writing bots for an MMORPG, so I definitely owe my career to videogames.

Always amusing when I see yet another person who started their coding journey writing RuneScape bots, seems like a really common path within a certain demographic. (I'm assuming RuneScape here because it was the largest bot community I was aware of but I suppose there could be others)

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#255

Post by TapWaterBandit »

dandellion wrote: post #240
fragmede wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound healthy! but you probably know someone who's unhealthily using them to cope and resorting to video games instead of life. some people take a few days off and forget to get back on

English is not my first language so maybe that's why it's strange to me to call something unhealthy that doesn't cause health issues. I could understand calling videogames "problematic" or "antisocial", but unhealthy seems a bit of a loaded term because I often shut myself in and forget about the rest of the world playing videogames and it rather improves my health. It's the stress that I find unhealthy, causing me e…

This is just a language misunderstanding. In English, "healthy/unhealthy" is often used to describe things outside physical health.

E. G. A healthy bank balance, an unhealthy obsession, a healthy debate etc.

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#256

Post by HyperSane »

PebblesRox wrote: post #168
mod wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At young ages, I say give them an old-school Nintendo, or N64 etc. Little/no advertising, monetization of your kid's attention, whatever. If they're not on the web or at school yet, they won't even know they're missing out on more modern systems. Or some similar setup where there's no online, no monthly charge, no pay-to-win, and instead the child gets to play a carefully crafted game, hopefully an awesome one. I als…

My kids have been enjoying this online remake of LodeRunner. [0] It's fun because I have fond memories of playing it on the Macintosh Classic II as a kid. They like making custom levels for each other, just like me and my siblings used to do. I was also happy to find an ad-free Minesweeper remake on Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzle Page. [1] They like the maps game from that page as well. [0] https://loderunnerwebgame.…

I played LodeRunner on the NES.

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#257

Post by Akronymus »

lucasfcosta wrote: post #221

I'll add the classic comment here: "correlation does not mean causation". Maybe it's the kids with better cognitive performance that like videogame better. I wouldn't find that unlikely considering it's more mentally stimulating than other "real-world" activities. Also, I personally learned to code by writing bots for an MMORPG, so I definitely owe my career to videogames.

As an allegedly gifted child: School was boring/not challenging enough. While video games progressed as fast as made sense.

I absolutely think that it's your PoV that's correct rather than the articles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUjYy4Ksy1E

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#258

Post by seventhtiger »

wheelerof4te wrote: post #205
drooby wrote: post #49

I credit RuneScape with teaching me the value of delayed gratification and basic economics. I credit competitive Halo 3 with teaching me team building and strategy skills. I credit StarCraft with training my mind to travel at warp speed. Honestly. My video game experience was instrumental to my success so far in life. This is not surprising to me.

I credit Age of Empires 2 for teaching me about managing an economy and medieval history. I credit Age of Wonders for teaching me what strategy really means. Lots of other great games helped me build my English skills, most of all The Legacy of Kain series.

I used to play a lot of RPGs on the gameboy, but my English was still not good enough so I avoided reading. Sometimes I had my gameboy and a dictionary and I'd translate NPC dialogue one word at a time.

I remember Final Fantasy 1 on gameboy had a surprisingly open world and I could walk all over the map, and it had random monster encounters. I'd be fighting a lengthy turn based battle about every 20 steps, and it could be way above my level, and I was completely and utterly lost!

I spent so much time on that game. But I never progressed far into the quest. Playing it as an adult I realized one random NPC says there's a hidden cave to the east, and if you never read it's pretty much impossible to find.

Similarly in Pokemon, bumbling through caves in the dark until I go out the other side through sheer luck and grit. Turns out the move Flash just lights up the cave.

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#259

Post by nkrisc »

lillecarl wrote: post #253
lucasfcosta wrote: post #221

I'll add the classic comment here: "correlation does not mean causation". Maybe it's the kids with better cognitive performance that like videogame better. I wouldn't find that unlikely considering it's more mentally stimulating than other "real-world" activities. Also, I personally learned to code by writing bots for an MMORPG, so I definitely owe my career to videogames.

I owe my career to World of Warcraft. Started running my own server in 2008 when the burning crusade was released on my ADSL connection for friends, then I started "scripting" shit in C++ (server software is a good framework (CMaNGOS)), so while it was compiled in it wasn't really like writing C++, never had to think about ownership, threading, lifetimes etc... Eventually I stared messing about more inside the framew…

Blizzard doesn’t embrace what you did, running a private WoW server. If they could have, they’d have shut you down. Certainly though it sounds as if your server was simply too small for them to ever notice. They focused their legal efforts against large private servers that sold access.

Re: Video gaming may be associated with better cognitive performance in children

#260

Post by rocketbop »

Silverback_VII wrote: post #241
lucasfcosta wrote: post #221

I'll add the classic comment here: "correlation does not mean causation". Maybe it's the kids with better cognitive performance that like videogame better. I wouldn't find that unlikely considering it's more mentally stimulating than other "real-world" activities. Also, I personally learned to code by writing bots for an MMORPG, so I definitely owe my career to videogames.

Maybe it is more of a gender difference. I have yet to encounter a boy who doesn't like some kind of videogame but not so for girls... But this would mean that intelligence in not distributed equally among gender.

I agree that intelligence is not a prerequisite for interest in games. Pretty much every boy in my school when I was growing up liked games and wanted to play them, and many of them were as thick as a plank.
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