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 ACTION plans - Exhibition House Wednesday Plan

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Scratch - Math Basketball VERSION KD MATH - 2 player/player vs computer

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Finish the math questions in 80 secs, then play all you want! Math: Easy Addition, Medium Multiplication, Hard division One vs Al: WASD & Space to shoot, shoot in red One vs One: P1 (Blue): WASD & space to shoot, Try to shoot it into the right (red) goal P2 ...

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2 stars 1 wish
It's kind of good.
I like how the scratch game is interesting.
Better improvements in scratch game

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Coding a game from website "scratch"

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How does gaming educate you?

Which part of the brain does it effect when gaming?

Do different video games affect your brain in different ways?

How does gaming education connects to global goals/issues.

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Positive effects of gaming to your brain →

Reaction time

Reading Comprehension

Critical Thinking

Relieve Stress

Spatial Thinking

Reasoning
Highly Social

Students who played video games scored 15 points above average in maths and reading tests and 17 points above average in science.

Different kinds of video games are already used as educational tools such as minecraft.

Minecraft edu is widely used in many schools (Over 1000 schools!)

Gamers therefore perform better at school

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Is gameplay good for us? It's a question I hear daily from gamers - as well as from their parents, teachers, doctors, therapists, and pastors.

There's certainly good reason to ask this question. Collectively, as a planet, we now spend more than one billion hours every single day playing videogames - a total that's up more than 50% from just three years ago. Meanwhile, the average young person racks up 10,000 hours playing videogames by the age of twenty-one. (By comparison, they will spend just 10,084 hours in the classroom throughout all of middle school and high school combined.)

The more we play, the more we reasonably want to know: Are we spending our time wisely, or are we wasting it? Are games a "good" use of our lives?

Let me propose three different ways of looking for the "good" of games - three questions that define "good for us" in substantially different ways.

1. Do videogames make us measurably better at anything? Do they improve our skills and abilities? Here, we can turn to scientific research for answers.

2. Are videogames worthwhile, compared to other activities, when it comes to our happiness and well-being? Will we feel better and enjoy life more if we play them? Here, we can ask gamers themselves about their subjective experience of videogames.

3. Do videogames have any meaning or purpose in the very big picture, in the grand scheme of things? Here, we can consider philosophical and moral considerations of gameplay.
What Scientists Say
Do videogames make us better at anything? Do they teach us new skills, improve our abilities, or help us function more effectively in real life?

The research here is increasingly persuasive. Scientists have found a wide variety of cognitive, emotional and social benefits to gaming in recent years, such as:

Gamers of all ages perform better than non-gamers on tests of attention, speed, accuracy, and multi-tasking. ( See the research)

Children who spend more time playing videogames score higher on tests of creativity. ( See the research)

Massively-multiplayer online role-playing games improve cognitive function among elderly players, and can help stave off age-related dementia. ( See the research)

Scary or violent videogames improve children's ability to manage difficult emotions, such as fear and anger ( See the research)

Parents who spend more time playing games with their kids have better relationships with them - and the kids have better moods, higher grades and less behavior problems ( See the research)

First-person shooter games improve our vision - so much so, that they can effectively treat cataracts. ( See the research)

Playing videogames gives us the ability to control our dreams and stop our own nightmares - and therefore are being used to treat post-traumatic stress. ( See the research)

Videogame technology can increase physical activity in children by 60% and decrease physiological risk factors for heart disease and diabetes. ( See the research)

These studies are just the tip of the iceberg. Over the next decade, we can expect to see more and more research into how videogames positively impact our real-life skills and abilities. This research will lead to more "results-oriented" gaming. Increasingly, we will play not just for the fun of it, but to become better versions of ourselves.

For many people, this shift toward real-world results will "redeem" gaming. It will take a seemingly pointless, waste-of-time activity and give it a new validity. Indeed, in my conversations with concerned parents, teachers and doctors, this kind of emerging scientific data seems to offer the most reassurance.

But I think it's just as important to consider how we feel when we play, in the moment of gaming, as it is to look for measurable and objective outcomes after we game. So let's see what gamers have to say about the subjective experience of gaming.
What Gamers Say
What makes us happy - and can games play an important role in achieving that happiness?

For years, I've been fascinated by one particular research project in the gaming industry- a survey of more than one thousand gamers to find out what emotions they seek out when they play their favorite games.

You can see the results of this survey, the top ten emotions of videogames, here - they range from bliss, to relief, to personal pride, to feeling emotionally close to another player, to surprise, to curiosity, to excitement, to awe and wonder.

What's extraordinary about these ten positive emotions is that gamers have figured out how to spark and feel them whenever they want, no matter where they are, or what kind of day they're having. It doesn't matter if they're bored or stressed or lonely or frustrated or anxious - gamers can change how they feel, just by starting to play. We know that this is true even for gamers in incredibly difficult conditions. For example, children in hospitals prior to surgery are able to control their anxiety by playing a handheld videogame ( see the research), while soldiers in Afghanistan are able to reduce psychological stress by nearly 75% by playing videogames for three to four hours a day ( see the research, specifically pages 33-34). In fact, recent clinical trials have demonstrated that online games can outperform pharmaceuticals for treating mild to moderate depression and anxiety. ( See the research)

I'm not sure that we've sufficiently valued this subjective benefit of gaming yet. When we ask "Are games good for us?" we should take more seriously the idea that games helps us feel better, in the moment, and that this is important work. Reducing the time we spend experiencing negative emotions and increasing the time we spend experiencing positive emotions is a fundamental good in and of itself. Even if games don't change anything else in our lives, the power to change how we feel in the moment is a very good thing indeed. Games give us more control over our emotional destiny.

Positive emotions, of course are not the only way to measure happiness. In 2011, Dr. Martin Seligman, the founder of positive psychology, proposed a new theoretical framework that encapsulated all of the major findings of scientific research on happiness and well-being to date. He called it PERMA, an acronym for the five things that add up to sustained and lasting happiness:

Positive emotions

Engagement with challenging work and activities that require us to use our personal strengths

Relationships or strong social connections with friends, family, peers

Meaning or a sense of being a part of something bigger than ourselves or being of service to a larger group or cause

Accomplishment or the chance to learn, get better and achieve

When I interview gamers about the impact of games, I use the PERMA framework as my rubric. I ask not only about if a game provokes specific positive emotions, but also:

Do you feel fully engaged by the game? Do you feel a sense of "flow"?

Do you play with other family members at home?

Do you use online games to stay in touch with distant friends?

Do you feel more extroverted, or more likely to interact with others, when you play?

Do you feel a part of a larger community?

Do you contribute to that community - on forums, or wikis, or by making demo video or tutorials?

Are you proud of your accomplishments in this game? Has the game made you more resilient?

These are important questions for every gamer to get a better sense of whether games are playing a helpful role in increasing their overall happiness and well-being. The more a particular game leads to answers of "yes" on these questions, I would argue the better the game is. Indeed, if a game is yielding answers of "yes" to two or more of the five questions, you can confidently say, "Yes, this game is good for me because it improves my quality of life." Our quality of life is determined by how much PERMA we can create for ourselves - and games can help us create more of it.

I rank the ability to lead a happy, satisfying life as an even higher good than developing new skills and abilities. But there is a third way to consider the good of games that may outrank them both.

This is the philosophical consideration of why we play.
What Philosophers Say
When I was a graduate student in 2003, I had the opportunity to attend the first annual meeting of the newly organized Digital Games Research Association, or DiGRA. Hundreds of researchers from the humanities had gathered in Utrecht, the Netherlands to present scholarly studies of why we play, and what makes videogames unique as an art form and cultural practice.

The keynote session was an interview between Eric Zimmerman, an important experimental game designer, and Brian Sutton-Smith, one of the great psychologists of play from the entire twentieth century, who has studied play since before videogames existed. This keynote interview, it was everyone's hope, would serve as a bridge between the long history of academic research on non-digital play and the new burgeoning field of digital game design and research.

I'll never forget the very first question and answer of the keynote. I'm not sure I heard the rest of the interview in fact, because the first question and answer left such an impression on me. As I recorded the exchange in my notes - there is no official transcript - Zimmerman asked, "What can you tell us about the important of studying game play? Why should we study digital games?" And Sutton-Smith thought for a moment, and then answered in a booming, and slightly cranky, voice, "WHY do we study play? WHY? We study play because LIFE is CRAP. Life is crap, and it's full of pain and suffering, and the ONLY thing that makes it worth living the ONLY thing that makes it possible to get up in the morning and go on living is play. Art, and play." This was a bit of an unexpected answer, and the audience laughed nervously, and I remember Zimmerman having to regroup a bit to continue the conversation.

I'm not sure what anyone else thought at the time, but I heard absolute truth in that answer.

There is something transcendent about playing games that lifts us up and out of the tedium and pain of everyday life.

What is it about games that is transcendent? Perhaps it's the fact that games are optional, they are obstacles that we volunteer to overcome. Games are what we choose to do. They are what we are drawn to when we have a choice about how to spend our time and energy. Games are freedom.

Perhaps it's the social and communal aspect of games, that we must all cooperate together to play by the same rules and respect the same values and stay with each other until the game is done, even if we are losing. Games bring us, and keep us, together - and the more people who know how to play a game, the bigger a community we become.

Perhaps it's the architectural and mathematical elegance of games, the structure of their goals and rules and scoring that produce heightened ways of thinking and interacting that don't happen in our normal daily lives. Games are structure, carefully designed structure, and structure is art.

Being exposed to these things - to freedom, to community, to art - is a transcendent good, a good that, as Sutton-Smith said, makes life worth living.

My favorite philosopher, Albert Camus, begins his most important work, "The Myth of Sisyphus", by stating: "There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy."

I'm not sure there are many game designers or game researchers (besides myself) who would argue that games are an answer to the fundamental question of philosophy, that is to say the question of suicide. But that is the big question that I think games are best poised to answer. Not "are games good for us", but "Do games make life worth living?"

This question can't be answered by scientific research or by interviewing players. It's an existential question, and we need a strong philosophy of play to explore it.

Ultimately, I think this question trumps the others. Games don't have to make us better at anything, or even make us happier, to be good. Games are transcendent.

Indeed, in The Grasshopper, one of the most important scholarly texts on games ever written, philosopher Bernard Suits argues that if by some miracle we ever managed to create a perfectly utopian society, in which we had all the resources we needed, and there was no need to work, and no conflict to resolve, games would in fact be the only reason to go on living. We would have to play, or else we would have no purpose in our lives. Games are the very last thing, Suits argues, that can bring a sense of service and collective meaning to our lives when we solve every other problem on earth.

Even when everything is perfect, games will still be good for us.

Here are a few questions for discussion:

Which approach to demonstrating the "good" of games do you think is most valid or important? Do you prefer the scientific approach (Do videogames make us better?), a subjective assessment (Do videogames contribute to our happiness and well-being?), or a more philosophical approach (Do videogames matter)?

Are videogames a source of "real" happiness? Do the positive emotions, social connection, and sense of purpose and accomplishment we feel when we play contribute to real well-being? Or do you think these positive outcomes are merely "virtual"? Are they too fleeting or too disconnected from our "real lives" to matter?

What research should we be doing to better understand the impact of games? If you could design a scientific study to answer any one question about games, what would it be?

In your own life, what videogames would you say have been "good" for you? How would you describe their positive impacts? On the other hand, have there been games that you felt were "bad" for you? What makes the difference between a game that has a positive impact, for you personally, and a game that has a negative impact?

Do game developers have an ethical obligation to consider the impacts of their games on gamers' real lives and relationships? Is this obligation any more or less than other creators of media or art? Would you encourage designers to become more familiar with scientific research on games' impacts, and allow it to influence their design? Or do you think that would that interfere with the artistic process?

Discussion Summary

As we explored the potential positive impacts of gaming together, one idea came up again and again: That gaming is an alternative to something "real" or "productive." There seems to be a fundamental belief about games - even among gamers - that by choosing to play, we are turning our back on something. We are turning our back either on reality itself, or at the very least, on a productive relationship with reality. And therefore gameplay is defined as a choice that seems fraught with potential peril.

For example, as one participant wrote: "It is easy to get stuck in a game and become completely emerged in it and think of nothing else like any other addict. I've been there... So we must look after one another and help each other manage our gaming so that other parts of our lives function as well." Here, gaming is set up as a discrete part of life that is somehow in opposition to functioning as a productive human being.

Even for those who readily accept there are benefits to gaming, there are still doubts about choosing to play. In fact, most participants in the discussion asked some variation of this question: "But how do we know when it's too much gaming?" or "When does it become an addiction or dangerous distraction?"

Others argued that gameplay is a choice that is in opposition to potentially more "productive" activities - for example, playing Guitar Hero instead of practicing musical lessons on a traditional, "real" guitar. Therefore, we need to assess "minute for minute, the value compared to other activities." It seems that we need more evidence to justify choosing to play than choosing to do something "real."

I think it's important to identify (and possibly challenge) the assumptions behind these questions and concerns. The assumptions I would say are two-fold: First, that when we play a game, we are doing something other than living "real life". And second, that activity with a "productive purpose" other than enjoyment or social interaction is at least equally as important to a good life and a good society as play, if not more important and valuable to a good life and a good society than play.

Where does the belief that playing a game is somehow not fully participating in "real life" come from? One participant in the discussion pointed out the similar etymology of words to describe play and things that are not real: "Even more striking are such words as allude, collude, and illusion, all of which are derivatives of the Latin ludere, and all of which refer to a sham, shadow, or simulated reality."

The fact that games are a protected space, a kind of "magic circle" where we are not punished for doing things we might ordinarily be punished for (think about the violence in contact sports, the deceit inherent in poker, the trash-talking on online videogames) also no doubt adds to this belief. And of course, in videogames, you're engaging with simulated worlds, rather than physical reality. But what I want to question is this: Does changing social norms to allow for different kinds of behavior make an experience less real? Or is it just allowing us to participant temporarily in a different reality? Likewise, is interacting with a digital simulation of physical space a less real activity in terms of cognition, emotional engagement and social interaction than non-gaming physical exploration or social interaction? I understand that phenomenologically and ontologically we are talking about very different things - exploring a "real" cave in the physical world versus navigating an avatar through one - and we could certainly argue the relative merits of each. (The physical cave offers more exercise and a richer sensory experience; the virtual cave allows you to experience things that might not be readily available in your local environment and it's safer.) But regardless of which is better, are we actually saying that a physical and cognitive experience of a virtual world isn't a real experience? It's still embodied, it's still activating our brains.

It leads me to wonder: Would our discussion of games and their value be improved if we accepted first that games are a "real" experience, and not an alternative to reality? And do we need to have a conversation about what constitutes "productive" activity? Is it not "productive", for example, to produce positive emotions, or to produce stronger relationships?

I believe this leaves us with Two New Big Questions:

1. Are games "real"? If so, in what ways? Put another way: Why do we so often consider games "separate from reality" or "opposed to reality" or an "alternative to reality"? Is it actually possible foranythingwe experience during our real, waking lives to be "separate from or "opposed to" reality"? Are we in some sense "dreaming" when we play? Or can you make the case that gameplay is as "real" an activity and experience as anything else we do during our waking lives? How would you make such a case?

2. Does having a "purpose" ruin the spirit of play? Is there something fundamental about traditional forms of gameplay that requires there to be no intention or purpose other than engagement, enjoyment, immersion or a desire to win? Or can you "play with purpose" (like self-improvement, or solving a real-world problem) and still achieve the same sense of freedom, voluntary engagement, lack of fear of failure, etc? If so, is there any philosophical tradition that supports this idea of playing with purpose, rather than play being fundamentally defined as purposeless or without meaning?

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Is gameplay good for us? It's a question I hear daily from gamers - as well as from their parents, teachers, doctors, therapists, and pastors. There's certainly good reason to ask this question. Collectively, as a planet, we now spend more than one billion hours every single day playing videogame

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Children who play online video games tend to do better in academic science, maths and reading tests, according to an analysis of data from over 12,000 high school students in Australia.

The study found that students who played online games almost every day scored 15 points above average in maths and reading tests and 17 points above average in science. However, the study's methodology cannot prove that playing video games were the cause of the improvement.

Alberto Posso, from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, analysed data from high school students across Australia taking the 2012 Program for International Student Assessment (Pisa) - internationally recognised tests that are administered by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The study looked at the correlation between academic scores and the children's personal interests and activities outside of school, including internet usage.

Posso, who published the research in the International Journal of Communication, said: "The analysis shows that those students who play online video games obtain higher scores on Pisa tests, all other things being equal.

"When you play online games you're solving puzzles to move to the next level and that involves using some of the general knowledge and skills in maths, reading and science that you've been taught during the day."

The cause of the association between game playing and academic success is not clear from the research. It is possible that children who are gifted at maths, science and reading are more likely to play online games. Alternatively, it could be that more proficient students work more efficiently, and therefore have more free time, making online gaming a marker of possible academic ability rather than something that actively boosts performance.

Posso also looked at the correlation between social media use and Pisa scores. He concluded that users of sites such as Facebook and Twitter were more likely to score 4% lower on average, and the more frequent the social networking usage, the bigger the difference. 78% of the teenagers said they used social networks every day.

Other studies have found a link between heavy users of social networking and a low attention span, which is also linked to poorer academic performance, but the evidence is less than conclusive.

Peter Etchells, senior lecturer in biological psychology at Bath Spa University, who is not connected with the study, said: "It's interesting that this study showed a positive correlation between online gaming and academic performance, but we really need better ways of understanding how and why people play video games before we're able to tease apart what that correlation actually means, if anything.

"A number of researchers have been trying to highlight this issue for a while but we really need more detailed research and nuanced data to answer these sorts of questions more confidently."

Other studies into the effects of video games on academic performance have shown similar results, either displaying no negative impact or positive effects associated with complex tasks, reasoning and dexterity, as well as reinforcing failure as a learning device. A recent study from Columbia University showed that high video game usage by children aged 6 to 11 was associated with a greatly increased chance of high intellectual functioning and overall school competence.

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Positive link between video games and academic performance, study suggests

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Children who play online video games tend to do better in academic science, maths and reading tests, according to an analysis of data from over 12,000 high school students in Australia. The study found that students who played online games almost every day scored 15 points above average in maths and reading tests and 17 points above average in science.

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Video games are everywhere. With kids starting to play simple iPhone games as young as two years old, video game addiction has become a problem. But video games can affect our brains in other surprising ways.

10 Sibling Relationships

According to the old saying, "the family that slays together stays together." Nothing improves sibling relationships more than brutally slaughtering each other in Call of Duty. And now, science has proven it.

In 2015, Brigham Young University conducted a study to determine how playing video games together affected sibling relationships. They had brothers and sisters report how often they played video games, how often they played with their siblings, how often they had conflict with their siblings, and how they would rate their sibling relationships. Then the researchers asked the study participants to name the top three games that they liked to play with their siblings.

The results surprised the researchers. Siblings who played violent video games together had less sibling conflict. This goes against most video game research that says violent video games increase aggression. But one has to consider the context. Most of the time, the siblings are defending each other against violent opponents. It's kind of hard to stay mad at your little brother when you remember that he saved your life in Halo.

Researchers also found that video games increased affection between siblings due to shared experiences. "By immersing themselves in the video game world, siblings can share experiences, play together, and strengthen sibling bonds," explained researcher Sarah Coyne.

The researchers theorize that playing video games together may be a new way to strengthen sibling relationships like never before.

9 The Bystander Effect

The bystander effect is one of the darkest things that humans naturally do. Starting with the murder of Kitty Genovese, psychologists discovered that if there are more people in a given area, it becomes less likely that one of them will help a person in trouble. Most people assume that someone else nearby will take care of the problem.

A study by the University of Innsbruck found that the bystander effect also happens in video games and can linger after the game is over. When there are more non-playable characters (NPCs), players are less likely to help other NPCs. Research has proven that even if the presence of other people is imaginary, people are still less likely to help out.

The participants in the study were asked to play Counter-Strike: Condition Zero in two groups: One would play as a member of a police team against a terrorist team, and one would play as a single police officer trying to stop a terrorist.

After the game was over, the participants were asked to assist a student trying to complete his own project. They were asked how much time they were willing to spend helping the student. Participants who were solo game players were willing to devote more time to helping the student than those who played on teams. The imaginary team still existed in players' minds despite the fact that the game had ended.

8 Moral Sensitivity

Morality video games are a relatively new idea. In the game, you can choose whether to be good or evil, and your choices affect the end of the game. As of early 2016, games like and have some of the best reviews and are surging in popularity. The idea that the entire game's story will change with every decision is appealing to players. But how will it affect behavior?

As always, science has the answer. A study led by the University of Buffalo examined the effects of being good or bad in a video game. They asked participants to play a first-person shooter game as either a police officer or a terrorist.

The game informed the player of the motivations and goals of the characters. After the game, the participants completed a Moral Foundations Questionnaire and were asked to rate their guilt and shame about what they had done.

Participants who played the terrorist rated higher on guilt and shame. This surprised the researchers because they expected players to become desensitized to violence and moral violations.

Yet players who experienced evil intentions as a video game character actually became more sensitive to the evil in the world. But it only happened if they originally felt guilt. If they didn't initially feel guilt for their actions, that's a worrisome sign.

7 Desensitization To Death

Video games open up new worlds and let us experience things that would be unthinkable in real life. In video games, we save worlds, play the hero, and go to fantasy worlds that we never thought possible.

We can form harems, save or topple nations, and discover truths about the world and ourselves. We can even die and come back to life-repeatedly. In some games, characters' deaths are essential to the story.

A study by Auburn University examined the correlation between violent video games and suicide capability. Suicide capability is defined as "the ability to overcome fear of death and a tolerance to pain to commit suicide."

The theory behind the study was that playing violent video games desensitizes players to death and increases their capability to commit suicide as a result.

Participants were asked how often they played violent video games and the average rating for the games they played (E for everyone, ET for everyone 10 and up, T for teen, M for mature). Then they filled out psychometric questionnaires about fearlessness of death and pain tolerance.

Surprisingly, the frequency of playing violent video games had little effect on the fearlessness of death. Once a participant had completed a violent video game, the effects stayed with them. People who played more violent video games had less fear of death but not an increase in pain tolerance.

Keep in mind that this study isn't saying that people who play violent video games will commit suicide. It simply means that they are more comfortable with the idea of death and dying than others.

6 Aggression

There has been a media storm that links violence in video games to mass shootings. Although studies repeatedly show that video games increase aggression, it again depends on the context: If you are playing a hero, you are likely less aggressive than someone who plays a villain.

Research led by the National Science Foundation found that players of violent video games in a prosocial context (such as helping a fellow character) were less aggressive than players of violent video games in a morally ambiguous context.

Participants played one of three video games: a zombie game in which the character protected a fellow character as they collected supplies, a zombie game in which the character was hunting zombies for sport, and a puzzle game that was like Tetris.

The participants were told that they were playing against another participant, but they were actually playing against a computer. The "loser" of each round had an unpleasant blast of white noise sent through their headphones. The intensity and volume of the white noise was set by the "winner."

The computer was programmed to win 12 times and let the participants win 13 times. Although both were aggressive, participants playing the prosocial zombie game were much more lenient than the morally ambiguous players when deciding the intensity of the white noise. The most benevolent players were the puzzle game participants.

5 Regulation Of Emotions

It's no surprise that video game therapy is now considered a legitimate form of treatment. After all, equine therapy has been an effective form of treatment for a long time. If animals can help people overcome mental issues, why not video games?

Researchers at the Eating Disorders Unit of Bellvitge Hospital in Barcelona, Spain, wondered if video game therapy would help girls to overcome eating disorders. They particularly focused on bulimia nervosa, an eating disorder in which patients binge (overeat) and then immediately purge (vomit the contents of their stomach). Surprisingly, video game therapy does help in this context.

PlayMancer is a new platform that uses a biofeedback machine to play video games. The game objectives are designed to help players control impulses and learn to relax in stressful situations.

Based on results from the biofeedback machine, the games become more difficult as the players become more nervous and stressed. In some games, the character won't move until the player's breathing becomes slow and steady, they make proper facial expressions, or their heartbeat slows down.

The researchers found that girls who played the games had reduced anxiety and more impulse control at the end of their treatment. The use of simulated situations through video games proved to be an effective treatment because "89 percent of the patients were abstinent from bingeing and 100 percent from vomiting, and these gains were maintained at the end of [regular] treatment."

This study is being used as a pioneer to explore more effects of video game therapy.

4 Self-Esteem

Everyone has a favorite character, whether it is from a book, movie, or video game. People write fan fiction, draw fan art, and even dress up as their favorite characters.

Thousands of people cosplay as their favorite characters at conventions around the world. Heck, professional cosplaying is now a legitimate way to make a living. But what are the effects for growing attached to someone who isn't even real?

Michigan State University and the University of California at Santa Barbara decided to explore the subject. They asked study participants to rate how much they agreed with statements such as "I consider my character a friend of mine" and "I can see myself getting into a relationship with my character."

Then they asked participants to rate how much they enjoyed video games with good characters, how often they played video games, and how high their levels of self-esteem were.

Participants with higher character attachment often had lower self-esteem, even if they enjoyed the game more and played it more often. After all, it would be extremely disappointing to find the perfect girl only to realize that she wasn't real.

This doesn't mean that enjoying characters' stories or writing fan fiction about them is a bad thing, just that obsession is undesirable and could have negative effects.

3 A Special Emotional Reaction

Many people have become attached to certain video games, and it expresses itself in all sorts of crazy ways-from buying extensive video game collections to killing other people in the name of video game characters. This isn't shocking because people were obsessed with book and movie characters before video games even existed.

But it may be a surprise to learn that video games elicit a special type of reaction from players. An article by the University of Munster addresses this phenomenon of " eudaimonic reactions," which are meaningful reactions that are not hedonic.

Those are emotions that don't directly tie into enjoyment or pleasure. This includes how we reflect the story, how playing the game satisfies our need to be competent and enhances our cognitive function during the game, and how interacting with other characters or players satisfies some of our need to socialize.

The article discusses how the use of narrative, context, and mechanics introduces new layers of interaction and more layers of response. "Although each of the dimensions discussed above makes unique contributions to the gaming experience, it is when all three factors-narrative, mechanics, and context-interact in concert that games may be able to create the most powerful experiences," said author Malte Elson.

Video games unleash a totally new experience for people. They play the characters, they witness the story, and they interact with the game world.

2 The Avatar Effect

Half the fun of playing video games is personalizing and customizing an avatar. Games like and rely on players customizing the characters to look like themselves to make the game more lifelike and personal. But what does this do when we play violent video games?

A study by the University of Sussex and the University of Innsbruck found that personalizing an avatar increased a person's level of aggression when playing violent video games.

Participants were divided into four group: those who personalized an avatar in a violent video game, those who personalized an avatar in a nonviolent video game, those who played the violent video game with a generic avatar, and those who played a nonviolent video game with a generic avatar.

After participants played their game for 30 minutes, they were asked to help the researcher with another study. Another person would come in to taste-test some hot chili sauce. The participants were told that this new person "couldn't stand hot chili sauce but was doing it for the good pay."

The participants were then asked to administer the sauce because the taste tester had to be blind for the study. The researchers left the room while the participants put any amount of extremely hot chili sauce into a bowl. After the participants left, the amount of sauce was weighed.

Even though they were told that the participant didn't like hot chili sauce, the people who poured the most sauce into the bowl were those who played the violent video game with personalized avatars. Researchers noted that it didn't matter if they made the character look like themselves. As long as they took the time to customize the avatar, aggression increased.

1 Reaction Time

It's common knowledge that the faster you try to finish something, the less accurate or correct it is. A hastily written paper isn't nearly as good as one written carefully over a couple of days. Food cooked quickly usually isn't as good as food cooked correctly.

Maybe you've had that one friend who says "Think fast!" and then throws something at you. Usually, you'll miss it because you didn't have enough time to figure out where to place your hands to catch it. If you usually catch it, congratulations. That's impressive.

An article by the University of Rochester discussed the relationship between increased motion discrimination, task switching, and visual search abilities in those who played video games and those who didn't.

They found that those who played video games-especially games like Call of Duty or Halo that required the player to think quickly and shoot accurately-had increased their ability to sense motion, keep track of people or items in their peripheral vision, and switch from one task to another quickly.

The article concluded by suggesting that video game training may be an effective form of reducing reaction time and increasing high cognitive functions.

Roxanne is currently studying psychology and Shakespeare at Southern Utah University. She also plays way too many video games. The perfect game would have psychology and Shakespeare themes, but sadly, that hasn't happened yet.

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Video games are everywhere. With kids starting to play simple iPhone games as young as two years old, video game addiction has become a problem. But video games can affect our brains in other surprising ways. 10 Sibling Relationships According to the old saying, 'the family that slays together stays together.'

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YEAH

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We may think we're pretty smart, but in fact we have very little notion of how humans learn. Kids know: They play games. Until, that is, they go to school. That's when the games stop. And often, so does the learning.

That was the sad panorama painted by a panel of distinguished experts on education and "gamification" who nonetheless were optimistic about the promise of using games in pedagogy.

The panel discussion, held at the Graduate School of Education (GSE) on Feb. 26, was part of the yearlong public course, Education's Digital Future (Educ 403x). Roy Pea, co-convener of the class and a professor in the GSE, introduced the speakers by noting that what he called "gaming to learn" has been around Stanford for close to a decade. (One of the speakers later noted that Wikipedia claims that Stanford students in 1971 invented the first known instance of a coin-operated video game.) But it is only recently that gamification's possibilities in the realm of education truly have been appreciated.

Bringing games to bear in education is not a matter of dumbing down. Constance Steinkuehler, an associate professor of digital media at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and co-director of the Games+Learning+Society (GLS) center there, noted that "it turns out games are hard." If indeed humans think immeasurably better as part of a network than on their own, then games are an obvious terrain in which to set minds free and let them wander around, interacting with whatever or whomever they encounter. The system of points, badges, rewards and leaderboards featured in most massively multiplayer online (MMO) games can be replicated in an educational context, experts say, to account for people's different motivations and needs for interaction or self-expression.

Freedom and choice

Tuesday's panelists, among the field's leading figures in academia, design and policy, zeroed in on freedom and choice as crucial factors in explaining why and how children learn.

"I think we're all impressed by how stupid humans are," remarked James Gee, a professor of literacy studies at Arizona State University, who holds degrees in philosophy and linguistics from Stanford. "It reaches almost epic proportions. We're stupid in dozens and dozens of ways.

"But human minds are plug-and-play devices; they're not meant to be used alone. They're meant to be used in networks." Games allow us to do that - they allow us to use what Gee calls "collective intelligence." Collectively, we're not so stupid.

Further, games help us develop non-cognitive skills that the panelists agreed are as fundamental as cognitive skills in explaining how we learn and if we succeed. According to Gee, skills such as patience and discipline, which one should acquire as a child but often does not, correlate with success better than IQ scores do. And those non-cognitive skills - that is, not what you know but how you behave - are far better suited to a game context than to a traditional classroom and textbook context.

Steinkuehler, who just finished a two-year stint as senior policy analyst at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, described her research at the University of Wisconsin. Her GLS group found that choice was critical for ultimate performance. Research shows that boys typically read a couple of grades below level in school, but these same boys, it turns out, read texts way above their grade level if the texts are part of online games. This was a puzzle, and Steinkuehler wanted to figure it out. A series of tests, accompanied by pizza, showed that if the boys could choose what they read, which they could do with online games, they pushed themselves harder. That result held for boys who were struggling to begin with and for those who already were on track.

"Games are architectures for engagement," Steinkuehler said, and her work with the boys showed why engagement matters. It was another example of Gee's "collective intelligence."

Similarly, Malcolm Bauer, formerly a professor at Carnegie-Mellon University and current director of assessment at GlassLab, situated at Redwood City-based Electronic Arts and part of the Institute of Play nonprofit design studio, recounted his youth in New York City playing arcade games. There, he and his brother had a community that collaborated, took risks, built stuff and had fun. But when time ran out, this future computer scientist would trudge back home to do his homework.

"People play everywhere except in school," he said. At GlassLab, his group tries to find digital analogs for teachers' assessment practices. He also pointed out that rewards go way beyond simple stars. Variation can also be a reward for good work. Better questions, in other words, and more difficult tasks.

Dan Schwartz, professor of education at the GSE, was the final speaker. He runs the AAA Lab at Stanford - a technology and learning lab where he and his collaborators have confirmed that current learning measures do not match up with games. This is a problem; either you change the games, "making them more schoolish," or you change the measurement terms.

"Games allow us to measure learning in ways we couldn't do before," he said. And, he added, echoing Gee's discussion of non-cognitive learning, "knowledge is not the outcome we want; we want students to learn how to make choices." In studying how kids played games, his group found that one of the best negative predictors of performance was the act of walking away after failure. Low scores themselves were far less significant than abandonment, and abandonment is a measurement that does not exist in a traditional classroom.

Access

During the lively conversation that followed the presentations - the overflow crowd included designers, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, students, teachers and professors -one student asked how gamification could be made available to poor children. How can they get access to games that might teach them far more than they learn with textbooks?

"Access doesn't solve the equity problem," Gee noted. "It is conversation that is crucial to how literacy develops; it's interaction. The crucial thing with books is that you learn to read like a writer, you think about how it was designed. The same things are absolutely true about digital media. Giving a kid the game won't work. You have to get the kid to play like a designer. You have to interact. Lots of charity groups say let's give them games. But we didn't solve the problem by giving them books."

The traditional classroom, panelists agreed, in many ways stifles some of the attributes most crucial for human learning: persistence, risk taking, collaboration, problem solving. Attributes all found back in Bauer's childhood arcade.
R. F. MacKay is a writer for the Office of the Vice Provost for Online Learning.

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Using games as an educational tool provides opportunities for deeper learning, panelists at Stanford event say

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We may think we're pretty smart, but in fact we have very little notion of how humans learn. Kids know: They play games. Until, that is, they go to school. That's when the games stop. And often, so does the learning.

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7 ways that video games affect your brain in a good way

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7 ways that video games affect your brain in a good way

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Amazing ways!

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The first video games were not designed with education in mind. Pong, Mario Brothers, Sonic the Hedgehog and Street Fighter didn't help anyone learn algebra, practice vocabulary, or memorize details of Ancient Roman history, but they were fun. Because of their entertaining nature, video games developed a bad rap over the years for "rotting kids' brains" or distracting them from more studious pursuits. Fortunately, we know now that playing video games is far from a waste of time.

A number of recent studies have indicated that video games, even violent ones, can help kids develop essential emotional and intellectual skills that support academic achievement. These findings led many innovative teachers around the globe to recognize the benefits of gaming and include game-based learning in their curricula. However, it's not just in-school gaming that reaps benefits. New research shows that all gaming can be positive.
1. For most gamers, gaming is a highly-social activity.
Seventy percent of gamers play with their friends who are in the same room, and only 20 percent play alone. In many of these games, players work together in teams to achieve goals, compete against other players or both. Their teamwork abilities are put to the test, and they must hone their communication and interpersonal skills in order to progress. These pro-social behaviors are critical for healthy social development -- children with positive social skills are more likely to have high self-esteem, good peer relationships and achieve in school. They are also more likely to have successful marriages and careers.
2. Games improve critical thinking skills and reading comprehension.
Many teachers today struggle to make subjects like classical literature relevant for their students, who grew up in the rapidly-moving world of the internet. The ability to travel virtually anywhere on Earth in an instant via Google makes Odysseus's 10-year journey home seem painfully slow. Video games present a valuable opportunity to make important material more relevant and engaging for students.

"Alternate reality games (ARGs) can be used as an immersive learning system that combines rich narrative, digital technology, and real-world game play," author Paul Darvasi wrote in an article for KQED. "Students must exercise critical thinking, resilience, and creative problem solving to succeed in an ARG."

Video games enable students to put themselves in the shoes of a character or immerse themselves in a place or culture that they are learning about in the classroom. These types of interactive experiences get students more excited about the material and support long-term retention.
3. Video games make people happy and relieve stress.
Video games can have positive, therapeutic effects on players of all ages, especially those with mental or emotional problems. Games provide a chance to tune out the stresses of everyday life and decompress. Giving your mind time to rest is critical for emotional and mental well-being. Relaxation reduces the risk of heart problems and stroke, boosts memory, buffers against depression, and helps decision making. It even has physical health benefits, by suppressing urges to stress-eat and reducing acne. And all these benefits come from doing something that's actually fun to do!
4. Video games are especially well-suited for individualized learning.
Every student is different. For most teachers and their schools, having sufficient resources to provide every student with an individualized learning plan is a faraway dream. But video games can make it a reality. Games allow students to learn at their own pace without constant parental oversight. Players' experience can be tailored based on their performance and preferences. If they solve problems correctly, the game can adjust to present more difficult challenges. If they struggle with a concept, the game can present the same concept in a different context or decrease the difficulty level until the student gets it.

"By balancing gameplay enjoyment with an appropriate level of challenge, games have the ability to keep players in their own unique optimally challenging and engaging zone for learning," wrote Jan Plass, an NYU Professor of digital media and learning sciences.
5. Games teach new technical skill sets.
Video games are a powerful way to get kids interested in technology from an early age, and teach them basic technical skills that will reap rewards down the road. For example, the wildly popular game Angry Birds is now teaching children basic coding principles. Video games also hone spatial thinking, reasoning, memory, perception, and problem-solving -- all which come in handy for a wide-range of technical careers.
6. Video games help gauge children's cognitive development and facilitate individualized learning.
Traditionally the best way to assess students' progress and abilities were through tests and quizzes, but these only reveal a small sliver of how that student is doing. Video games can offer highly detailed statistics in real-time. They collect data every step of the way, which offers context for a child's development and specific learning habits. This enables a deeper understanding of how the students are actually interacting with the material, and allows teachers to give immediate feedback.

Many teachers think games can motivate struggling students. Low-performing students are often disengaged from what is happening in the classroom, and require the most individualized learning plans. Games are an effective vehicle for addressing these learning gaps. Seventy-eight percent of teachers in a national survey said that digital games improved low-performing students' mastery of curricular content and skills (math, language arts, etc.), and 71 percent said they improved mastery of extra-curricular skills (technology, communication, critical thinking, etc.) Games not only motivate low-performing students to attend class, but also help them pay attention and make stronger efforts to succeed.
7. They offer a fluid and literary-like engagement with ethically- and morally-complicated situations.
Teaching empathy is both extremely important and extremely difficult. A team of researchers at UC Berkeley found that empathy and compassion are cornerstones of a happy, meaningful life. Empathy is also a building block of morality, breeds courage and reduces prejudice and racism. But it is not something that can be instilled from a book or verbal repetition. It emerges in emotional situations, which video games can simulate.

Games such as Pixelberry's own High School Story allow players to explore complex ethical and moral problems that can be otherwise difficult to simulate. These games allow players to grapple with sensitive issues in an environment free from social pressure or fear of consequences. Then when put in similar situations in the real world, they are better equipped to figure things out for themselves and make good choices.

Games are helping create an educational future where kids are deeply engaged and excited by what they're learning, receive the personal attention and feedback that they need and are able to develop important skills on their own. Implementing digital games in the classroom has already yielded " amazing gains," and we're just beginning to explore their potential. It's time for educators and game developers alike to build a new paradigm for education.

Have you ever learned something from a game? How do video games help your children in school?

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7 Ways Video Games Will Help Your Kids in School

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The first video games were not designed with education in mind. Pong, Mario Brothers, Sonic the Hedgehog and Street Fighter didn't help anyone learn algebra, practice vocabulary, or memorize details of Ancient Roman history, but they were fun.