So-called brain training games have been a phenomenon of recent years with a Nintendo DS-bound gamer a common sight on underground train systems worldwide, tapping away furiously in the understanding that they were not only having fun but also improving their neurology.
But research this week by the BBC has shown that such games do not actually improve brain activity in any general sense…instead people who played certain games over a repeated time just got better at playing those particular games. One of the research team from the Medical Research Council here in the UK went onto say that:
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.
What these games however have shown is that game mechanics are an incredibly powerful way of encouraging people to pick up new mental skills and this is a lesson that we in the business of sharing meditation has to take note of.
Watch the clip from BBC’s entertaining Bang Goes the Theory for whom the research was done:
