"Action game players make more correct decisions per unit time."
Probably the single best excuse for playing video games. This quote comes from UR professor of brain and cognitive science, Daphne Bavelier. In a recent study, she has found that action gamers are up to 25% more likely to come up with correct answers to questions faster than people who do not play such games. The perceived reason Bavelier attributes to the performance boost comes from the heightened sense of surroundings that action gamers have while playing.
This is a great excuse I can make for playing Halo Reach until 3:30 am today, launch day for the game. I was improving my decision making skills! Side note, the game is very fun. I was expecting stellar graphics, and they were good, by Xbox standards. I was hoping that Reach would rival PC games, but it does not unfortunately. See my suggestion on improving Xbox graphics.
Bavelier goes on to say that the reaction time, accuracy, isn't just limited to visuals, but in also audio tests. The process of making a right choice is called probabilistic inference. The brain collects bits of visual and audible information and calculates what is perceived as the best choice. "Decisions are never black and white," she said. "The brain is always computing probabilities. As you drive, for instance, you may see a movement on your right, estimate whether you are on a collision course, and based on that probability make a binary decision: brake or don't brake."
You can read more about the study in a future journal of Current Biology. In the mean time, see the school page on the study. Authors of the study; Daphne Bavelier, Alexandre Pouget, and C. Shawn Green show how a regimin of video game playing could improve your reaction and decision making. But, regular gamers already know this, right?
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