The Good Side of Video Games

Video games have a good side to them. Video games have been giving a bad reputation for being violent and teaching children to be aggressive. Video games have been thought of as a complete time waster and unhealthy. Now, over the turn of the century, video games have gone from bad to good. Game designers have given video games a total makeover to help rehabilitate, to get healthy, and to get physical.

One example of what video games are good for is that they relieve stress. When people come home from work or just took a big test, they want to find a way to relax. By concentrating on the video game being played, people temporarily forget about the stress and problems of that day. Also by playing the video game, people have a great filling of accomplishment when they complete a challenge. A study by a gaming company shows there is a large majority of people who play video games to relieve stress.

Video games can help improve vision. Some people may have found that hard to believe. Parents usually tell their kids they will go blind if they sit too close to the television set. Studies have shown that by playing a few hours a day on video games, it will improve a person’s eyesight by twenty percent. Daphne Bavelier, professor of brain and cognitive sciences says, “Action video game play changes the way our brain process visual information. These games push the human visual system to the limits and the brain adapts to it.”

Playing the new Wii’s video games can help a person get physical and healthy, but should not replace real exercise. Active virtual video games help burn sixty to seventy calories an hour. Some sports on virtual video games include golf, tennis, boxing, and dancing. Virtual video games can also improve children’s confidence about trying out for a certain sport or activity. Virtual video games stimulate greater energy expenditure than ordinary video games that have kids sit on the couch all day (Fiona MacRae).

Video games help children with obesity. It’s consider an ally to help kids to slim down. The kids lose four times as many calories than sit-down versions. Kids’ love of video games can be exploited to help turn the tide of obesity. Playing one game for thirty-five minutes will burn 150 calories (Suzanne Hunter).

Video games are helping scientists to see what causes epilepsy in teenagers. Scientists may have learned that certain brain waves are the main key on how one can remember their way from one place to another. Scientists hope to cure epilepsy and memory disorder. The way scientists or researchers examine the teenagers’ brain waves are by putting wires on the surface of the brain as the teenagers are placed in virtual environments. Planting the wire on the brain’s surface is a safe way, so not to harm the brain’s parts that are important for language, memory, etc. The teenagers must find their way out of the virtual maze. They have to remember how they got there and where they have been. This way, neurosurgeons can find and remove a certain part of the brain that is causing the seizures. As the teenagers are busy playing the video games, the scientists look at theta oscillations, slow, rhythmic waves of electrical activity. They happen when clusters of cells of the brain go off at the same time. When brain waves go crazy, they can cause seizures. Sekular, Ph.D., the Louis and France Salvage Professor of Psychology at Brandeis says, “By playing video games today, these heroic teenagers are helping the kids of the future have happier, healthier, seizure free lives. With more work, we may be able to understand why the brain’s rhythmic activity sometimes spins out of control. [The] long-range goal is developing a cure for epilepsy.”