NASA developed technology that trains the brain using videogames.

Wii-Hab: Video Game Therapy

The Nintendo Wii is being used as a form of therapy for some elderly patients.

Patients use Wii video games for therapy, recovery from injury or surgery.

Brain Scans Reveal Video Gamers' Secrets


How adeptly you play a video game may indicate how big some parts of your brain are, the authors of a new study report.

Researchers found that certain regions of the brain are larger in young people who do a better job of playing a specially designed video game.

In the new study, researchers turned to a decades-old video game called Space Fortress. Scientists developed the game, akin to a flight simulator and the classic Space Invaders, to study learning. According to Kramer, it takes about 20 hours for undergraduate students to learn how to become good at the game.

Using MRIs, the study authors measured the size of specific brain regions of 42 participants (aged 18 to 28) before they began playing the video game.

Then the researchers tried to find links between the sizes of different brain regions and how well people played the game. "We wanted to know if individual differences are important in how well people can learn a complex new skill over a limited period of time," Kramer said. "We decided to look into these areas because we've learned an awful lot about the neural circuits that contribute to learning new skills."


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Researchers at Georgia Tech have developed a prototype system that allows deaf children to practice their American Sign Language and get immediate feedback.

Modified Home Video Game Shows Promise for Improving Hand Function in Teens with Cerebral Palsy


Engineers at Rutgers University have modified a popular home video game system to help teenagers with cerebral palsy improve hand functions. In a pilot trial with three participants, the system improved the teens’ abilities to perform a range of daily personal and household activities.

The system is an example of both virtual rehabilitation, where patients interact with computer-generated visual environments to perform exercises, and tele-rehabilitation, where patients perform exercises under remote supervision by physical or occupational therapists.

“All three teens were more than a decade out from their perinatal strokes, yet we showed that improvement was still possible ,” said Meredith Golomb, associate professor of neurology at the Indiana University School of Medicine and Riley Hospital for Children pediatric neurologist in this study. “The virtual reality telerehabiltiaiton system kept them exercising by rewarding whatever movements they could make, and all three showed significant progress in hand function.”


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Doctors Prescribing 'Tetris Therapy'


The video game Tetris may quell flashbacks of traumatic events in a way that other kinds of games can't, researchers have found.

The curious effect might have to do with how the shapes in the game compete with images of a traumatic scene when it comes to getting stored in one's memory.

Tetris, one of the most popular video games of all time, involves moving and rotating shapes falling down a playing field with the aim of creating horizontal lines of blocks without gaps.

In earlier work, scientists at Oxford University in England found that playing Tetris after traumatic events could reduce flashbacks in healthy volunteers. The hope of this research is to reduce the painful memories linked with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).



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As we bring gameplay into more aspects of our lives (from socializing to exercising), Tom Chatfield talks about one compelling aspect of videogaming: its measurability. Parceling out rewards at carefully calibrated percentages, games collect reams of data about what humans truly find rewarding, and precisely how hard we're willing to work for a win.

An article at Game Forward presents a nice overview of the way that simulation programs are being used for military training and disaster preparedness.

One such popular defense tool is a virtual world game called Boarders Ahoy!. Developed by NATO's Allied Command Transformation, the training simulator prepares sailors for boarding a ship as part of a military inspection process. Users can practice interviewing the crew of the virtual ship, checking identification and locating the game's 250 searchable objects.

The United States Secret Service is also leveraging the training power of virtual worlds to prepare for national threats. "Tiny Town" is a small-scale model in use for the last four decades, which helps officials plan for such emergencies as chemical threats and enemy attacks. The model now has a 3D computer-generated counterpart, called Virtual Tiny Town. The software's advanced modeling cabilities can realistically simulate a variety of possible real-life threats, such as chemical, biological or radiological attacks, armed assaults, or suicide bombers. Planned upgrades will enhance the program's life-saving measures by adding health impacts and crowd behaviors to the model.


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Games like World of Warcraft give players the means to save worlds, and incentive to learn the habits of heroes. What if we could harness this gamer power to solve real-world problems? Jane McGonigal says we can, and explains how.

Sid2, Jane McGonigal has a brilliant idea here. Boincers could be a good group to start the kind of real-world game she has suggested. I challenge, or should I say Jane McGonigal has challenged, us all to start work on the real-world "epic wins" the real world needs. Maybe a forum thread dedicated to doing just that would be a good idea. I don't know how to start a thread, but since you found this, maybe you should do that. Actually, your post here has already started the ball rolling! Good job Sid2!

By the way, I don't know who balaji.tummala is but that is obviously not my signature to my previous post!

Gamers Succeed Where AIDS Researchers Could Not


Thousands of people playing an Internet game called Foldit successfully formulated a structure for a key enzyme related to the development of the AIDS virus, coming up with a model that had consistently eluded scientists.

By using a game developed by researchers at the University of Washington, players were able to come up with a viable structure for a protein that's crucial to the early development of AIDS. Foldit allows users to assemble potential proteins out of different molecular building blocks, and video game players ended up accomplishing what scientists couldn't.

The success of Foldit hints at the possibilities of citizen science, a scientific method that involves recruiting large numbers of people to help solve scientific problems. The field encompasses everything from categorizing different types of galaxies to using games, like Foldit, that help users to rapidly gain expertise in a subject.


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Game-based learning has been another point of controversy in education. Proponents say games heighten engagement and boost learning. Critics say games often teach students to beat the game but not learn the information. The real change in computer games in the next few years lies in the advent of social gaming.

Students connecting all over the world through social gaming can work together to solve global problems with games like A Crash Course in Saving the World and World Without Oil, or learn about their heritage as they do in Finding Identity.


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Imagine playing a video game controlled by your mind. Now imagine that game also teaches you about your own patterns of stress, relaxation and focus. At TEDxToronto Ariel Garten shows how looking at our own brain activity gives new meaning to the ancient dictum know thyself.

Ali Carr-Chellman: Gaming to re-engage boys in learning


Ali Carr-Chellman spells out three reasons boys are tuning out of school in droves, and lays out her bold plan to re-engage them: bringing their culture into the classroom, with new rules that let boys be boys, and video games that teach as well as entertain.

Life does not come with a reset button. That truth struck me whenever I glimpsed the face of my Nintendo Entertainment System. Reset was always there, lurking next to Power, ready to erase both my sins and the virtual world in which they had been committed. A fresh start, another try, Reset offered them free.

Moments like that, moments where some shadow of philosophical truth peaked through the veil of this childish pastime, came often over the years.

Other games have offered real life lessons in ways both subtle and overt. Here are 7 for your consideration.


7 Real Life Lessons Learned in Video Games: Maybe all that time wasn't wasted after all.