14 DAY TRIAL // Videogames claiming that constant play can actually improve the mental abilities of those engaged have been among the biggest hits on the Nintendo DS platform. The titles were marketed at both young players and the elderly promising that their mind would be better prepared for real world problems after the simulated training. Now, it seems the improvement claims were mostly false.
The result comes from a study conducted on more than 11,000 people originally for a BBC television show, which was then published in the scientific journal Nature. On a range of cognition and memory-oriented tests, the volunteers who actually played brain training games performed no better than those who did not use them and spent the same amount of time simply browsing the wonders of the Internet.
Doctor Adrian Owen, the assistant director of Medical Research Council’s Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, was the leader of the study and stated, “The results are clear. Statistically, there are no significant differences between the improvements seen in participants who played our brain training games, and those who just went on the internet for the same length of time.”
The study went on for six weeks and some might say the period was too short to allow the brain training videogames to have their effect on the mind. But Dr. Owen states that an actual effect on mental ability or on intelligence should have been statistically visible during the experiment, especially on those participants who have completed more than 200 brain training sessions during the six-week period.
Clive Ballard, who is the director of the Alzheimer’s Society, revealed that “This evidence could change the way we look at brain training games and shows staying active by taking a walk for example is a better use of our time. The next question is whether brain training can help maintain your brain as you get older.”