The development of attention skills in action video game players
Section snippets
Attentional networks and their development in action video game players
Recently, we and others have shown that playing action video games alters some of the fundamental aspects of visual attention (Bialystok, 2006; Castel, Pratt, & Drummond, 2005; Green and Bavelier, 2003, Green and Bavelier, 2006a, Green and Bavelier, 2006b; Greenfield, deWinstanley, Kilpatrick, & Kaye, 1994; Trick, Jaspers-Fayer, & Sethi, 2005). Expert action video game players (VGPs) were found to outperform non-gamer controls (NVGPs) on tasks measuring the spatial distribution and resolution
Subjects
A total of 131 subjects participated – of these, 75 were classified as NVGPs and 56 as VGPs. The frequency of video game play and the type of games played were assessed using a background questionnaire (see Appendix B) that required children to list the 10 games they had played the most in the preceding 12 months, and to estimate how long they played each game in a typical session along with how many sessions they played per month. A subject was classified post-hoc as a VGP if they reported
Results
Reaction times from incorrect trials were excluded from analyses. Following this, on a subject-by-subject basis, a mean RT was calculated for each of the 12 conditions (three flanker types by four cue types). Data were collapsed across target direction (left/right) and target location (above/below). On the basis of unusually slow and error-prone responses (more than two standard deviations beyond the mean for their age group and gaming status), data from six NVGPs were excluded from analysis
Effects of action video game experience on attention skills
Analysis of raw RT data revealed that VGPs responded more quickly than NVGPs, but did not make more errors. Speeded processing of visual information without a concomitant decrease in accuracy has now been reported by several groups in studies with adult subjects (e.g. Bialystok, 2006, Castel et al., 2005; Clark, Lanphear, & Riddick, 1987; Dye et al., submitted for publication), and here that finding is extended to children as young as 7 years of age. It suggests that across a wide range of
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the parents and children in Rochester NY who gave their time to facilitate the developmental aspects of the work reported here. Thanks also to Bruce McCandliss for comments on an earlier version of this manuscript. The research was made possible by a grant from the National Eye Institute to DB.
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