Critics regularly blame video games for everything from contributing to a slothful youth culture to encouraging aggressive behavior — but now some scientists are telling a different story, citing a litany of health benefits such as stress reduction, improved mood, pain management, lower heart rate, faster reaction time and better problem-solving abilities.

Personally, I have mixed feelings about some of this (see Daily Health News, “What’s the Best Brain Exercise?,” December 16, 2010), but I have to admit that the video game study I am writing about today piqued my interest — in my mind, this is the most intriguing application yet for this type of technology! A recent Oxford University study suggests that games similar to the old classic Tetris, an engrossing game in which a player quickly stacks and organizes colorful blocks as they cascade down the screen, can actually help prevent and treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Game On — Tetris vs. PTSD

Disturbing flashbacks, intensely vivid mental images of a past traumatic experience, are a common symptom of PTSD that can develop after experiences such as accidents, abuse, sexual molestation or military combat. Earlier research suggests that there is a six-hour window in which victims “consolidate” memories following a traumatic event. At Oxford, researchers theorized that distracting the brain during this period could act as a “cognitive vaccine” against flashbacks.

To test their hypothesis, the investigators asked 40 male volunteers (average age 23) to watch a 12-minute video. It graphically depicted a road accident that resulted in injury and death. The video was followed by a 30-minute unstructured break with no distractions provided except, for half the participants, 10 minutes of playing Tetris. Both groups were monitored for flashbacks over the following week — those who had played Tetrisreported experiencing significantly fewer than those who had not played.

The Oxford researchers concluded that distracting the brain with a Tetris-like game after a traumatic event helps prevent the mental integration of traumatic images and reduces the intensity and frequency of unwanted, involuntary flashbacks.

You’re in Control

These results make sense to Jayne Gackenbach, PhD, a psychologist who conducts game-related research at Grant MacEwan University in Alberta, Canada. Playing this type of video game may provide enough cognitive engagement to divert the brain from the normal “rev up” of the autonomic nervous system — the fight-or-flight response. It also puts the player into a mental state that combines concentration and relaxation. And, she said, people feel helpless in stressful or traumatic situations, whereas the opposite is true when you play a video game — you can take control, a feeling that can be particularly beneficial in countering the effects of PTSD. Dr. Gackenbach compares the calming and restorative effects of casual gaming to those of similarly absorbing activities such as meditation, prayer, long-distance running and board games like chess.

I honestly hope that nobody reading this suffers an event traumatic enough that they’d need to try to erase the anguish with a video game… and I am sure that no health expert would ever suggest that it would be a good idea to play these games for extended periods of time… but there may be some very practical ways these findings can be put to use in everyday life. For instance, if you suffer from chronic pain, this may be a way to distract yourself from what hurts and allow your brain to stop the continuous feedback loop that chronic pain can create. (For more on this topic, see Daily Health News, “Whoosh, Crash, Bang — Your Pain is Gone!,” August 9, 2010.) Another idea: A short round of the absorbing video game Angry Birds(or another one) may be a helpful timeout during a stressful period. As with all medical therapies, it seems that the wise use of video games is starting to fall into place right where logic would put it — the right amount, at the right time, and not more.

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