Post Comment - Blue's News

This is Your Brain on Multiplayer

[Feb 06, 2009, 02:17 am ET] - Share - Viewing Comments

Ars Technica reports on a research study where MRI scans demonstrate different types of brain activity in a game player if they thought they were playing against a human opponent, rather than a computer. The study indicates that three areas of the brain are more engaged when the subjects thought they were playing against a human, an effect more pronounced in men than women. Here's some of the takeaway of the Ars author:

The human brain appears to try to parse the intentions of others by engaging its own decision-making process; in short, it appears to model another person's mind by seeing what it would do if it were in that other person's skull. The three areas of the brain that the authors identify are involved, in part, in making executive decisions for that brain's owner, in addition to evaluating other people's executive decisions. So, the fact that they're busier when a person thinks they're playing another human could also be interpreted as them focusing harder on an identical decision making process.

Post Comment
Enter the details of the comment you'd like to post in the boxes below and click the button at the bottom of the form.

10.

Re: This is Your Brain on Multiplayer

Feb 6, 2009, 14:27

dubfanatic

Now this is the kind of video game research I can respect.

Subject

Comment Enter your comment here, but please respect the forum rules (below).

;) :( :o %) :) :| ;P X| :D More

If you have a signature set up, it will be automatically appended to your comment.
If you don't already have a Blue's News user account, you can sign up here.
Forgotten your password? Click here.

Email me when this topic is updated.

Special Codes

b[bold text]b
i[italic text]i
u[underline text]u
-[~~strikethrough text~~]-
c[code text]c
+[bullet point]+
q[quote text (indented)]q
[quote="Author"]quote text (indented)[/quote]
[url=Link]text[/url]
r{red text}r
g{green text}g
b{blue text}b
m{maroon text}m
s{secret text (shows in the background colour)}s

Forum Rules

Disagree all you want but attacks of a personal nature will not be tolerated.
Ethnic slurs and homophobic language will not be tolerated.
Do not post spam, links to warez sites, or instructions on how to obtain pirated software.
Abusing the forums in any manner that could be construed as 'griefing' will not be tolerated.