Effects Of Video Games

Since video games are very widespread among children, teenagers, and even adults, it’s important to study how they affect health and whether they have actual benefits.

Benefits of video games

• It was thought that video games are linked to sedentary life and being intellectually lazy, while in fact, playing video games moderately promotes a vast range of cognitive skills, such as higher ability in visual processing, more precision in attention allocation, and improved abilities in mental rotation (the ability to manipulate and correlate two- or three-dimensional objects in mind and rotate images to see how they look from a different angle).
• Playing video games motivates people of different ages to get together and enhances the ability to engage.
• Video games encourage the environment of group work and open the way for players to acquire significant social skills that promote cooperation and teamwork spirit.
• It has been seen that gaming might be one of the most efficient methods to improve the mood and increase positive feelings.
• When designed appropriately, video games open the way in front of children to experience the sense of being in control, have freedom of choice, have feelings of achievement, build connections with others, and explore their capabilities.

Harmful effects of video games

• Physical issues from extended playing hours, such as eye fatigue, pain in the neck, back, wrists, and hands, and obesity.
• Prolonged hours of playing video games leads to addiction, and that’s correlated with increased rates of depression, anxiety, and social isolation.
• Video games might also lead to lower self-esteem and an increased sense of violence.