“Brain games” are a very popular class of the so-called casual gaming category of video games, but a UK Broadcasting establishment study implies that they don’t improve cognitive abilities in any way. It was only a six-week study, but well over 8,000 eighteen to sixty year-olds were involved. Participants played these brain games for at least ten minutes a day and three days each week, but researchers couldn’t find any statistically significant difference between this group and a control group of almost 3000 that only surfed the Net.

These observations contradict those of others that had recommended a difference in memory among older game-players. Most psychologists nonetheless, caution that memory as a cognitive function is extraordinarily situation-specific, meaning that fungability or the cross-applicability tends to be low. For example, playing a video gaming classic like Tetris or Pacman will enhance your memory for jobs particular to those titles and not necessarily transfer over to others. It’s easily possible how improbable it is that video gaming performance should transpose into increased ability in something not related to gaming!

Confusing the matter further , however , is the chance that some brain games are a lot better than others and more handy, even if only a little so. The U. S. state Institutes of Health has developed some games in collaboration with a commercial distributor which do seem to have helped older folks that enjoy them. Then there are the criticisms of the BBC study, targeting particularly on its method, which involved spectators of its favored “Bang Goes the Theory” program a self-selected population, always suspect in severe scientific research.

Psychologists and cognitive scientists have long suggested activities like learning a new language or picking up a new sport for something that would truly challenge our intellectual abilities. Learning a new language is obviously mentally stimulating, but research now proves that new neuron connections are formed by powerful activity irrespective of what our age.