video-game

UC study finds near-transfer of cognitive training to be necessary (yet not sufficient) for far-transfer, broader benefits

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Guicheng “Ariel” Tan / UCI Work­ing Mem­o­ry & Plas­tic­i­ty Lab

Who ben­e­fits from brain train­ing, and why? (UCI release):

If you are skilled at play­ing puz­zles on your smart­phone or tablet, what does it say about how fast you learn new puz­zles, or more broad­ly, how well can you focus in school or at work? In the lan­guage of psy­chol­o­gists, does “near trans­fer” pre­dict “far transfer”?

A team of psy­chol­o­gists from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, Irvine and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, River­side reports in Nature Human Behav­ior that peo­ple who show near trans­fer are more like­ly to show far trans­fer. For a per­son skilled at play­ing a game, such as Wor­dle, near trans­fer refers to being skilled at sim­i­lar games, such as a cross­word puz­zle. An exam­ple of far trans­fer for this per­son would be the abil­i­ty to bet­ter focus on dai­ly life activ­i­ties. [Read more…] about UC study finds near-trans­fer of cog­ni­tive train­ing to be nec­es­sary (yet not suf­fi­cient) for far-trans­fer, broad­er benefits

Digital therapeutics pioneer Akili Interactive plans to go public in mid-2022 at a $1B valuation

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Pal­i­hapi­tiya-Led SPAC to Merge With Akili in $1 Bil­lion Deal (Bloomberg):

Akili Inter­ac­tive, a start­up that has devel­oped a video game to help treat atten­tion-deficit dis­or­ders in kids, has agreed to go pub­lic through a merg­er with one of Chamath Palihapitiya’s blank-check companies.

The deal, which con­firms a Bloomberg News report, val­ues the com­bined enti­ty at about $1 bil­lion, Akili and Social Cap­i­tal Suvret­ta Hold­ings Corp. I said in a state­ment seen by Bloomberg. It will pro­vide as much as $412 mil­lion in gross cash pro­ceeds, the com­pa­nies said. [Read more…] about Dig­i­tal ther­a­peu­tics pio­neer Akili Inter­ac­tive plans to go pub­lic in mid-2022 at a $1B valuation

NHS Choices helps improve brain health and science literacy by reporting findings in context — as seen in this brain training & schizophrenia example

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Video game-based ‘brain train­ing’ may help peo­ple with schiz­o­phre­nia (NHS Choices):

“Peo­ple with schiz­o­phre­nia can be trained by play­ing a video game to con­trol the part of the brain linked to ver­bal hal­lu­ci­na­tions,” BBC News reports [Read more…] about NHS Choic­es helps improve brain health and sci­ence lit­er­a­cy by report­ing find­ings in con­text — as seen in this brain train­ing & schiz­o­phre­nia example

Study: Why Super Mario 3D World may train your brain better than Angry Birds

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Stark_151124_01_1500_szPlay­ing 3‑D video games can boost mem­o­ry for­ma­tion, UCI study finds (UCI News):

“…Craig Stark and Dane Clemen­son of UCI’s Cen­ter for the Neu­ro­bi­ol­o­gy of Learn­ing & Mem­o­ry recruit­ed non-gamer col­lege stu­dents to play either a video game with a pas­sive, two-dimen­sion­al envi­ron­ment (“Angry Birds”) or one with an intri­cate, 3‑D set­ting (“Super Mario 3D World”) for 30 min­utes per day over two weeks. [Read more…] about Study: Why Super Mario 3D World may train your brain bet­ter than Angry Birds

Trend: Harnessing biometrics and cognitive training to improve athletic performance

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Is Cog­ni­tive Train­ing the Next Fron­tier in Sports? (iQ by Intel):

“The shift to quan­ti­ta­tive analy­sis of so-called ath­lete intan­gi­bles — data pre­vi­ous­ly unat­tain­able before track­ing devices pro­vid­ed empir­i­cal evi­dence — is replac­ing gut instinct and guess­work in sports…the vol­un­teers spent a half hour play­ing a unique video game that record­ed their phys­i­o­log­i­cal reac­tions to [Read more…] about Trend: Har­ness­ing bio­met­rics and cog­ni­tive train­ing to improve ath­let­ic performance

To treat depression, we will likely combine neuroplasticity-based brain training games with antidepressants

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BrainTrainingCom­put­er Games Bet­ter Than Med­ica­tion in Treat­ing Elder­ly Depres­sion (Live Science):

“Com­put­er games could help in treat­ing old­er peo­ple with depres­sion who haven’t been helped by anti­de­pres­sant drugs or oth­er treat­ments for the disorder…In a study of 11 old­er patients, researchers found play­ing cer­tain com­put­er games was just as effec­tive at reduc­ing symp­toms of depres­sion as [Read more…] about To treat depres­sion, we will like­ly com­bine neu­ro­plas­tic­i­ty-based brain train­ing games with antidepressants