Effect of video games on people Essay Example for Free

Effect of video games on people Essay Video games are frowned upon by parents and seen as time-wasters, and worse, some education experts think that these games corrupt the brain. â€Å" Violent video games are easily blamed by the media and some experts as the reason why some young people become violent or display extreme anti-social behavior. But many scientists and psychologists find that video games can actually have many benefits – the main one is making kids smart,† stated by Rase Smart Kid website. Video games may actually teach kids high-level thinking skills that they will need in the future. Video games change your brain, according to University of Wisconsin psychologist C. Shawn Green. Playing video games change the brain’s physical structure the same way as learning to read, playing an instrument, or orientate yourself with the help of a map. Much like exercise can build muscle, the powerful combination of concentration and surges of neurotransmitters can build the brain. Video games are not as bad as many envision them to be. There are many beneficial skills that can be drawn from video games that are not even taught by schools, these skills include strategy, perseverance, accuracy, quick thinking, problem solving and logic, multitasking, taking risks, situational awareness, and management. Steven Johnson, author of Everything Bad is Good For You: How Todays Popular Culture is Actually Making Us Smarter, calls this telescoping. Gamers must deal with immediate problems while keeping their long-term goals on their horizon. All gamers know that in order to get to your goal, you must get through everything else which may include traps and enemies. Facing strong enemies also requires a good strategy in order to defeat them whether its persistence or taking a new risk. A lot of games have multiple levels, for example Unblock Me. If a gamer fails one time, they will certainly play again and again to reach their destination or move onto the next level. Focus and planning is required most of the time. Action games, according to a study by the University of Rochester, train the brains of players to make faster decisions without losing accuracy. In today’s world, it is important to move quickly without sacrificing accuracy. Not only first person shooter games require accuracy but also action games. Whether it is tossing an apple in a bucket or swinging a wrecking ball at an abandoned building, both need accuracy to succeed. Sometimes the player makes fast decisions or analyses almost every second of the game giving the brain a real workout. According to researchers at the University of Rochester, led by Daphne Bavelier, a cognitive scientist, games simulating stressful events such as those found in battle or action games could be a training tool for real-world situations. The study suggests that playing action video games primes the brain to make quick decisions. Video games can be used to train soldiers and surgeons, according to the study. Importantly, decisions made by action-packed video game players are no less accurate. According to Bavelier, Action game players make more correct decisions per unit time. If you are a surgeon or you are in the middle of a battlefield, that can make all the difference. In strategy games, for instance, while developing a city, an unexpected surprise like an enemy might emerge. This forces the player to be flexible and quickly change tactics. One must hold off on building a unit and train troops instead to withstand the upcoming enemy. Most of the time if there are not enough troops trained, the player sacrifices a lot of their resources and must change to a different tactic once again. When kids play games such as The Incredible Machine, Angry Birds or Cut The Rope, they train their brain to come up with creative ways to solve puzzles and other problems in short bursts. When owning a business and something goes wrong or an unexpected situation occurs, the speed of a single correct decision will make a great impact and may save jobs for a lot of people. Winning in any game involves a players courage to take risks. Most games do not reward players who play safely. Taking risks does not mean that one must play recklessly and lose everything all at once if at the point of losing. Taking risks may very well be cautious as well. Taking risks means moving forward with anything a player can do whether it is making a move in one direction or the other, or even buying an item that may or may not help the player at all. In strategy games, players take different risks depending on the situation. One must analyze the situation prior to taking any risk. By doing so, the chances of winning are great than simply going about a routine. Defense News reported that the Army include video games to train soldiers improve their situational awareness in combat. Many strategy games also require players to become mindful of sudden situational changes in the game and adapt accordingly. Changes in combat require changing tactic or making new decisions. Sometimes they are for the better and sometimes for the worse. If the right decision is made in the right time, that has the potential to change almost everything. The player learns to manage resources that are limited, and decide the best use of resources, the same way as in real life. This skill is honed in strategy games such as SimCity, Age of Empires, and Railroad Tycoon. The way a player uses their resources in the early game will show in the late game how well their decisions really were. As far as video games go, they change a lot of things in the world today. Those that see the true power of video games will say that they do a lot of positive things. Those that do not understand video games, blame them for crimes and see them as very corrupting, often saying that they destroy lives. Video games have many good sides to them. For some people they are fun, for others they exercise the brain. It all depends on how you choose to look at games. The media is often opinion biased and not always true.