Video Games

Video Games ALERT: Global study issues warning on threats to hearing

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Today’s cultural zeitgeist is characterized by video games.  Many are played online while wearing headphones.  Few youngsters are interested in loud jam sessions simply because addictive games are nearly ubiquitous.  A recent study published in BMJ Public Health highlights how seemingly harmless video game audio directly threatens hearing.

Loud video games sabotage more than social skills

There is a common misconception that the risk of video games is limited to screen addiction and anti-social behavior.  The worldwide study linked above reveals gamers face an elevated risk of hearing loss and the annoying ringing in the ears, known as tinnitus.  Though games are fun and sometimes forge social connections through online play, their audio levels put more than 10 million people at risk in the United States alone.

Video game consoles such as Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 5 pack a powerful audio punch, generating up to 119 decibels of sound.  Exposure to a mere 85 decibels of sound across a lengthy period has the potential to result in hearing loss.  As a point of comparison, push lawnmowers typically have a sound decibel output of 70-80 decibels.  Video games that generate 119 decibels, albeit in brief bursts, are as loud as motorcycles and dirt bikes.

Global study reveals alarming noise exposure among frequent gamers and potential risks to hearing health

The study results stem from a comprehensive analysis of 50,000 people worldwide.  Gamers from nine nations, including the United States, Australia, Europe, and beyond, were analyzed.  Those who played games at a high frequency or even an above-average level of frequency typically exceeded the safe threshold for noise exposure.

Sadly, such eardrum abuse puts those gamers at risk for lasting hearing loss and possibly even dreaded tinnitus.  Going cold turkey on video games is unthinkable for most teens and even some young adults.  However, there are reasonable steps gamers can take to minimize their exposure to loud audio from their favorite games.

Tips to preserve your hearing while gaming

Instead of wearing headphones connected to handheld gaming consoles or a PC, play without a headset with the volume set at a reasonable level.  Resist the temptation to play loud video games for extended periods.  Take screen breaks every half hour to rest your eardrums.

Traditional over-the-ear headphones are safer than earbuds as they do not move sound waves directly toward the eardrums.  Put a post-it note by your gaming console or PC, serving as a reminder to clean your headphones/earbuds at least once each week to minimize dust mites, allergens, and other potentially harmful particles.

Invest in quality noise-canceling headphones to block out external noise.  This allows you to keep the volume at a safer level without sacrificing game audio clarity.  In addition, many games offer customizable audio settings.  Take advantage of these options to balance in-game sounds effectively without having to raise the overall volume.

Video games shown to improve cognitive function in children

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Children who played video games were shown to exhibit better cognitive function compared with those who didn’t, researchers reported in JAMA Network Open.

Bader Chaarani, PhD, of the department of psychiatry at the University of Vermont, and colleagues aimed to examine the association between video gaming and cognition in children through a case-control study.

Video game player
Children who played video games were shown to exhibit better cognitive function compared with those who didn’t. Source: Adobe Stock.

Chaarani and colleagues observed cognitive performance and blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signals among children aged 9 to 10 years who played video games and compared them with those who didn’t.

Children with valid neuroimaging and behavioral data were included. All participants completed a self-reported screen time survey, which included time spent specifically on video gaming.

Video gaming time, cognitive performance and BOLD signals were assessed with an n-back analysis. Working memory through stop signal tasks were assessed through functional MRIs.

A total of 2,217 children were included in the study (mean age, 9.9 years; 63.1% female). Of those who were included in the final sample for stop signal tasks, 1,128 children did not play video games and 679 children played them at least 21 hours per week. The final sample of those who completed the n-back analysis included 1,278 children who did not play video games and 800 children who played them for at least 21 hours per week.

Those who played video games performed better in both sample groups. Nonparametric analyses of functional MRI data demonstrated greater BOLD signals among children who played video games in the precuneus during inhibitory control.

“During working memory, a smaller BOLD signal was observed in [children who played video games] in parts of the occipital cortex and calcarine sulcus and a larger BOLD signal in the cingulate, middle, and frontal gyri and the precuneus,” the authors wrote.

In a release from the NIH, National Institute on Drug Abuse Director Nora Volkow, MD, stated that this study adds to the growing understanding of the associations between video gaming and brain development.

“Numerous studies have linked video gaming to behavior and mental health problems,” she said. “This study suggests that there may also be cognitive benefits associated with this popular pastime, which are worthy of further investigation.”

In a related editorial, Kirk M. Welker, MD, of the division of neuroradiology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said that making any recommendations based on functional MRI studies is “challenging.”

“By the nature of their design, most [functional] MRI studies on this topic fail to establish causality between video gaming and purported brain functional alterations,” Welker wrote. “Some studies may simply be uncovering inherent brain characteristics that lead certain individuals to gravitate toward video gaming. If, in fact, video games are altering neurocognition, the longevity of any cerebral changes induced by this activity remains largely unknown.”

Popular movie series gives a turbo boost to dangerous drivers

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Exposure to movies, video games and other media  that glamorize risky behavior have been linked to … well, risky behaviors in a number of studies in recent years.

But do pop culture messages propel people to take risks or do people prone to risky behavior gravitate to movies and games that reflect their way of life?

Writing in The Upshot, Harvard Medical School physician-scientist Anupam Jena reports new evidence suggesting that high-speed driving in the “Fast and Furious” series may push some motorists into overdrive. His research shows a spike in tickets  for extreme speeding on weekends following the release of these films.

Jena sat down with HM News to discuss his findings and their implications.

HM News: What did you find in your data that suggests the movies triggered the increase in fast driving?

Our data came from a large county in Maryland, where we presume the same drivers were on the streets more or less every weekend. But they  seemed to be driving their fastest on the weekends after the movies came out.

Traditionally, most studies that look at these questions have tried to measure attitudes and impacts in controlled lab settings.

We think a more promising approach is to analyze natural experiments that show how people actually behave after being exposed to risk-glorifying media.

HM News: And what do these studies find?

It varies. In some cases, the findings are counterintuitive.  For example, the release of a violent video game seems to have no effect on crime and may even decrease it, perhaps because, for some, playing video games is a form of psychological release that diffuses the urge to commit an actual crime.  Or, the simple act of playing a video game for hours on end means that that time isn’t spent in other, sinister, ways.

In other cases, the findings are grimmer. A recent study found that searches related to suicidal intent went way up with the release of 13 Reasons Why, a Netflix series that focused on teen suicide.

HM News: What were you hoping to learn from “Fast and Furious”?

Many studies have looked at risky or violent behavior in general, but since these movies portray street racing and reckless driving, we thought this would be a good case study in one specific type of risk-taking behavior: fast driving.

HM News:  And what did you find?

We looked at 192,892 speeding tickets recorded from 2012-2017 in Montgomery County, Maryland. Those years covered the release dates of three films in the series.

We found that drivers who got caught speeding were driving at speeds much higher over the limit on weekends just after these films were released. The overall number of tickets doesn’t go up, but the amount that people are speeding increases. We suspect this is because these people would have driven fast anyway but now they are induced to drive faster. Comparing the three weekends before each movie’s release with the three weekends after, we found that the ticketed speed increased almost 20 percent, to an average of 19 miles per hour over the speed limit, from 16 miles per hour.

Even more disturbingly, the number of extreme speeders—that’s people driving more than 40 miles per hour over the limit— more than doubled after the film was released.  And we know from location data on the tickets that these extreme speeders were clustered around the movie theaters in the area.

HM News: How did you come up with this question?

I’ve always been interested in the role that media plays in our lives. This specific idea came out of a brainstorming session with several excellent summer students.

HM News:  Is there a bigger lesson here?

One lesson is to keep looking for natural experiments that can give us insight into the way people behave in the real world. It is difficult to generalize conclusions about the effects of media exposure on human behavior without specific data.  It is critical to study this intricate interplay between message exposure and behavior because some of these scenarios have important real-world consequences.

That’s the other lesson here:  Even a fantastic, out-of-this world movie franchise like “Fast and Furious” that has our heroes parachuting their cars out of a cargo plane into the middle of a high-speed chase on a twisting mountain road can have very tangible effects on the way people behave in the real world.

Audiences are lining up to watch this guy play video games badly

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Michael Jones from Rooster Teeth.

Michael Jones from Rooster Teeth.

When Michael Jones takes the stage, he doesn’t hold a mic or a musical instrument. His main tools to entertain are his video game controller and the words that come out of his mouth.

“I certainly didn’t think I’d find myself in this situation,” said Jones, 29.

After graduating high school, Jones apprenticed as an electrician. He bought a camera to film family moments, and decided to film himself playing video games for fun.

 In July 2010, he posted an expletive-laden video of him chasing of one of the impossible-to-catch orbs in “Crackdown 2.” It went viral and suddenly people noticed.

“I realized, ‘Oh, people like it when I’m pissed?'” Jones said. “I’m from New Jersey. I do that all the time.”

Six months later, production company Rooster Teeth asked him to join its team, and in January 2011 he launched his online show “Rage Quit,”a series featuring him playing difficult levels or challenges in video games. Spoiler alert: It usually ends in him quitting with an epic tantrum. It’s gotten more than 350 million views to date on YouTube.

“Anybody can play a video game,” said Jones. “You don’t have to be good. I consider myself okay. I’m better than the average person, but compared to people on the Internet I’m horrible.”

The youngest of three brothers, Jones grew up in Woodbridge, NJ, playing video games. He fondly remembers his brothers saving money to buy him a Nintendo 64 for his tenth birthday…then his middle brother claimed he didn’t mean to give it as a gift and took it for himself.

“There was not a lot of controller sharing going on in the household,” he said.

Jones is now about to embark on the four-city “Let’s Play Live” tour with the other stars of production company Rooster Teeth’s “Achievement Hunter” channel, where they will perform for his online — and now offline — fans. First up will be a stop on April 24 in Jones’ home state of New Jersey at the 2,900-seat New Jersey Performance Arts Center in Newark.

“Now my Mom is asking for tickets for my Aunt and Uncle, my cousin — so many tickets,” he said joking. “Mom, leave some for the audience.”

Then, they’ll pack up the tour bus and head to Baltimore, MD, Orlando, FL, and Tampa, FL. Previously, Jones and the rest of the “Achievement Hunter” crew sold out venues in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Austin, bringing their brand of rowdy commentary and hijinks to a live audience.

He’s also done other projects with Rooster Teeth, including starring in “Lazer Team,” one of the top fundraised Indiegogo film campaigns of all time. He also is a voice actor in the company’s anime series “RWBY,” in which his wife Lindsay Jones voices the main role.

People may not see the appeal of watching someone else play a video game, but it’s the same as watching someone else play basketball on TV which is why it easily translates live, Jones points out. On top of that, the guys on the “Let’s Play Live” tour chat about things you talk about with your friends, turning it from a voyeur sport to a comedy show, he said.

“Video games give us this amazing platform,” said Jones. “We could walk into the office and go into a room, and we would have this exact same conversation.”

He admits audience members who expect to see well-executed gameplay will be disappointed, but that’s not stopping him.

“I wouldn’t put us on the same level as musicians or superstars,” Jones said. “For some reason we fooled them (our fans), and they just want to consume our content in any possible way.”

Watch the video doctumentary. URL:

Source:http://www.cnbc.com

Video Games and Alzheimer’s: That’s Improbable

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  • by Marc Abrahams
    Improbable Research

This Very-Complicated-Chain-of-Logic Press Release says that video-game playing mightcause Alzheimer’s disease: “It is important for future research to confirm that gaming does not have a negative effect on the hippocampus.”

How to think about poo: A 7-minute talk about the anus and its functions by PhD student Giulia Enders has attracted a lot of attention.

“The more we learn, the less we understand,” says a geneticist about weighing the promises of big genomics.

“Despite the highly hazardous life-style led by comic book characters such as Tintin, we are unaware of any previous systematic description of the challenges and health impairments faced by Tintin in the course of his adventures,” says a study on the cartoon character’s health.

The World Health Organization has shifted its attention from physical diseases to linguistic ones.

9 Practical Steps to Prepare for Tough Negotiations.

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Why should I give you what you want?

Why shouldn’t you do what I say?

Why won’t you listen to what I need?

No matter what career you work in or business you run, at some point you will be involved in negotiations. Some negotiations are simple, others not so much!

To shine and succeed in negotiations, it all comes down to three words: PREPARE, PREPARE, PREPARE!

When you actually get in the room or on the phone and start the negotiations, everything flows based on how well you’ve preparedbeforehand. Whether it’s negotiating a pay rise in your job, negotiating a deal or contract with a supplier or client, or negotiating a solution to a workplace meltdown, you need to prep before you take the floor!

Aaron and I have both held corporate career positions requiring regular negotiations with internal and external stakeholders. It’s something we’re both very familiar and confident with. So let us share with you our top 9 practical steps to support you in preparing for tough negotiations…

1. Be clear on what you want

To get what you want out of a negotiation, you need to be crystal clear on exactly what outcome you are seeking to achieve.

Write it down and break it into components.

  • What is the ultimate outcome?
  • What components make up that overall outcome?
  • What is the minimum result you’re willing to accept?

When doing this exercise, really challenge yourself to be clear on what outcomes are most important, what are non-negotiable must haves, and what results really aren’t ‘die in the ditch’ deal breakers.

People at work

2. Understand where the other party is coming from

Any negotiation requires at least two parties. Your job is to know what both parties want, in order to prepare yourself to navigate and direct the negotiations.

You’ve just done the exercise to get clear on what you want. Now you need to consider where the other party is coming from. What do they want? If you’re not sure, put yourself in their shoes and consider what their ideal outcome is likely to be?

Spend a little time thinking about what factors are most important to them.

3. Articulate the gap

A negotiation only exists because there’s a gap between two parties. If you were both aligned wanting the same outcome, there would be no negotiation, there would simply be agreement.

On the basis that what you both want differs, your job now is to articulate the gap between what you want and what they want. Understand how far apart you are. What are the major differences of opinion? What are the crucial factors/resources at stake?

Write it down.nego2

4. Find your common ground

Now that you know what the gap is, what keeps you apart, turn your attention to what your common ground is.

In order to bridge the gap, you need to find that common ground to create connection, relationship and a way to close the gap.

  • What do you both have in common?
  • What do you both agree upon?
  • What can you leverage as a basis for agreement?
  • What points in the negotiation can you easily come to a conclusion on to gain positive win win ground early on.

5. Be clear on what you’re willing to give away

The art of negotiation is being willing to give as well as take.

Both parties will have something to give that the other party needs and wants. Often times there are things you can give away in the negotiation that are of high value to the other side, but of little to no consequence to you. It’s like when you ask for a discount when buying a laptop or appliance, and the sales person offers you an extended warranty instead. That extended warranty is meant to appear as great value to you, with it being of little to no cost to them. They are using the art of giving as a way of appeasing you in the negotiations, in order to get away from providing a discount (what you want and what they’re not willing to give).

What are you willing to give away?120309-A-AO884-167

6. Be confident in your position

If you prepare properly before a negotiation, you will have greater confidence in yourself and in your position. Remind yourself that you may not get the full result you’re aiming for in the first instance, and that that’s no reason to have your confidence rocked.

Be prepared to be patient, to value what you have to offer, and to hold your ground.

7. Empathy for the other party

Negotiations do not go well when both parties come in with a war mind-set. You’re going into negotiations, not battle. Anyone who walks their career or business path with a genuine ‘win win’ mind-set, will triumph personally and professionally over time.

A “I’m going to win and you’re going to lose” approach is negative, cocky and is a choice you make which comes across very clearly in your body language, tone of voice and presentation.

Always enter any negotiation with a solutions mind-set, looking for the best outcome for both parties. This doesn’t prevent you from being confident, assertive, crystal clear and authoritative in directing the process and outcomes.

8. Have a plan

Plot out how you would ideally like the negotiations to go, so that you can direct it that way if possible.

Be clear on what your starting point is, that is your opening message, your opening point for discussion and what is most important to convey to the other party early on in the meeting.

Be aware of how long you are willing to wait if the negotiations hit a stalemate, before you’re willing to give something away, or before you will change approach.

9. Reminders to take in with you

Go into the negotiations remembering that the following things make a difference to how you feel during the negotiations and to your outcomes:

  • Be an active listener, because you pick up valuable information by listening properly.
  • If nervous during a negotiation, change your body posture – if on the phone, stand up. If sitting down, hold yourself upright and hold your head high.

 

Prepare for your negotiations and remember that practise makes perfect. It takes a little time and practise to perfect the art of negotiation and each opportunity you have to negotiate allows you to learn and expand your capabilities.