Brain Training Games are Useless

[mirgro]

CommonMan said:
I don't really like the tone of this study. It's not that it's supposed to be "better" than other ways to stimulate your brain, it just stimulates it.

“There is good evidence that keeping mentally active is good for you and can stave off the effects of old age,” he said in an April 19 telephone interview from Philadelphia, where he was stranded by volcanic ash spewed in Iceland. “You might want to read a good book or learn a foreign language rather than investing a lot of time or money in a brain trainer.”

This just sounds like an Ebert-esque dismissal of video games as a medium for doing this. I paid $20 for brain age 2 on my DS, which is about the cost of one good hardcover book and WAY cheaper than either Rosetta Stone or going to a class to learn a foreign language, which could cost you thousands of dollars.

The problem is that people DON'T stimulate their brains enough, Brain Age and related software are just there to get people to stimulate their brains more, not make your IQ raise. And they are certainly no more "useless" than any other video game.

Well I'd argue the last point. Studies have been done showing that fast shooters, like Unreal Tournamenet 2004 not Halo or any recent shooters, improve your driving a whole bunch. I don't know how much a bunch is, but it does.

Strategy games, were also shown to improve brain functions at one point or another.