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This article claims a study shows that the cognitive abilities of 60-77 year olds can be helped by playing two weeks of World of Warcraft.

This article quotes a navy researcher as saying adults generally can get similar benefits:

"We have discovered that video game players perform 10 to 20 percent higher in terms of perceptual and cognitive ability than normal people that are non-game players," s

...

"We know that video games can increase perceptual abilities and short-term memory," he said. They allow the player to focus longer and expand the player's field of vision compared to people who don't play video games, he added.

And this article claims similar results for children.

Psychologists have discovered that the specially designed games act like a workout for the mind and after just eight weeks can lead to dramatic increases in IQ and test results.

Scientists studied 600 children who played an online game called Junglememory Children in the study have seen dramatic improvements in their ability to solve mathematical and verbal problems and have seen IQ scores jump by 10 after the course.

Will video games improve children's IQ (or other measurements of intelligence)?

Community
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  • [Removed obsolete comments.] – Oddthinking Feb 28 '12 at 07:19
  • @Jim Thio: what do you think is wrong in those two articles that makes you skeptical of their results? – nico Feb 28 '12 at 07:42
  • My wife think it's wrong. I think it's right. I don't doubt that at all. My wife believe the opposite. So I need the power of awesome sceptics to magically convince my wife that video games are awesome. Some recommendation would be great too :) –  Feb 28 '12 at 08:27
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    Can I draw your attention to "**specially designed games** act like a workout for the mind". The paper is not claiming that Angry Birds improves your IQ. It's claiming that it is possible to write educational software in the form of a game. Hardly controversial. – DJClayworth Feb 28 '12 at 16:09
  • @DJClayworth That is for the last claim. It doesn't apply to the overall question. – Sonny Ordell Feb 28 '12 at 21:19
  • I still do not get the point of this question. What is the claim? You are citing two peer-reviewed papers. What other evidence would convince your wife? If she does not believe these papers (because, I assume, she is against videogame) she is not going to believe any other peer-reviewed paper. Unless, I repeat, there is some big fault in those studies, that -at the moment- I do not see pointed out. – nico Feb 29 '12 at 08:20
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    I have removed the entire update portion. It did not add to the question of does it impact children's IQ's. It just confused the question. And convincing the OP's wife is to localized for this Q&A site. – Chad Feb 29 '12 at 14:55
  • AFAIK, there was paper showing how playing shooters improves situational awareness. – vartec Apr 28 '12 at 16:28
  • Downvoted because there's no good way to answer the question given the sources you've cited. They all claim to be based on a mystical study that isn't linked anywhere in any of the articles, so it's impossible to say if they are based on a study that only established a correlation that has no real meaning. In the more general sense, "Will video games improve children's IQ (or other measurements of intelligence)?", the answer is yes, of course, games that are designed to improve cognitive skills will help, but you could find that answer with a trivial search on google. –  Apr 30 '12 at 06:27
  • I think any popular games, like warcraft, diablo iii or world of warcraft will improve kids' intelligence. Something that require programming, like world of warcraft, or hacking like notepad would do fine. –  May 01 '12 at 02:02
  • Moreover, because dumb people breed more kids than the smart, I've read that flyn effect happen mainly due to video games. –  May 01 '12 at 02:03
  • [The latest critical take on the matter](http://www.psychology.gatech.edu/renglelab/Publications/2011/Shipstead_Psych%20Bul.pdf): "contrary to the reports provided at the beginning of this article (and contrary to the claims of commercial providers),the present literature provides insufficient evidence of its efficacy" There's also more video game specific literature. – Ruben Jul 04 '12 at 11:27
  • What you do most you do best. – kaiya Dec 22 '19 at 15:23

1 Answers1

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Specifically designed games increase working memory performance and may boost intelligence scores:

http://www.pnas.org/content/105/19/6829.full

http://www.cogmed.com/gains-fluid-intelligence-training-nonverbal-reasoning-4yearold-children-controlled-randomized-study#.T5u4zFK92Xs

If the popular games feature elements similar to the games referenced in the links, then yes. Most likely, they do not.

Cogmed develops games for training working memory, which affects intelligence. However, significant effects do not occur for verbal training. This is only one of several studies using the games that they developed.

Jaeggi and colleagues found that in order for the training of working memory to affect intelligence, the amount of training matters.

The take home message is that the game design together with amount of gaming determines the outcome in "boosting" intelligence.

noumenal
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  • Hi and thanks for the answer, can you please provide a little more context, maybe a quote from the articles? thanks. – Sklivvz Apr 28 '12 at 13:49
  • @Skliwz I have updated the an above, in attempt to offer context. Let me know if its lacking. The studies I mention have been carried out in children at age 4 and men and women in their twenties. The task described in the paper by Jaeggi and colleagues is actually a computer game. (PS The first paper is open access.) – noumenal Apr 28 '12 at 15:55
  • Anybody interested in a rundown of why these studies are a) subject to conflicts of interest b) poorly designed? – Ruben May 30 '12 at 19:50
  • @Ruben Sure thing. What is your view? – noumenal May 31 '12 at 13:04
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    a) the authors sell the training programs that they use in their studies. Jaeggi et al. don't acknowledge this, Klingberg does. b) Here's a [review](http://jtoomim.org/brain-training/%282010%29%20Shipstead%20et%20al.%20-%20Does%20WM%20Training%20Generalize%20=%20Review.pdf) which shows in how many ways these studies fall short of a good RCT design (not randomised, weak control groups, etc.) c) Also I suspect publication bias in these findings considering the small samples and large effects they obtain, no published null findings and my personal knowledge of two unpublished nonreplications. – Ruben Jun 05 '12 at 19:05
  • The concerns raised by Shipstead and colleagues (2010) have been addressed by Jaeggi and colleagues (2011), where they cite the paper: http://www.pnas.org/content/108/25/10081.full – noumenal Jun 06 '12 at 13:33
  • Instead, Jaeggi (2011, Abstract) "propose that future research should not investigate whether cognitive training works, but rather should determine what training regimens and what training conditions result in the best transfer effects, investigate the underlying neural and cognitive mechanisms, and finally, investigate for whom cognitive training is most useful". This is largely consistent with addressing the concerns raised by Shipstead and colleagues (2012) concerning experimenter effects and generalizable transfer ( http://www.gwern.net/docs/2012-shipstead.pdf). – noumenal Jun 06 '12 at 13:33
  • It appears that the Cogmed product is more used than Jaeggi's (Shipstead et al., 2012), and members of the Klingberg group are wary about active control groups (see e.g. Thorell et al., 2009; http://www.klingberglab.se/pub/Thorell2009.pdf). Furthermore, Shipstead et al. 2012 attempt to address the file-drawer problem aspect by including papers that have not been subject to peer review. – noumenal Jun 06 '12 at 13:33
  • On a final note, I think that the more critical perspective is fruitful, but the criticism in the literature appears to be provided mainly on the theoretical level. In my personal view, refuting experiments by experiments would be a more convincing approach, rather than adding multiple requirements to, and additional restrictions upon, an already complex paradigm, but I am open to revision. I am also not convinced that it is the advocates of WM training that have a file-drawer problem. – noumenal Jun 06 '12 at 13:34
  • Sorry, I didn't see your reply because you didn't include my name in your comment. The reply does deal with some concerns, but it's still not an RCT (not randomized, no blinding reported). Cogmed have done RCTs, Klingberg et al. (2005). Future research should have replicated the effect in independent, unbiased groups and I know of two who didn't (one is Engle, last author from the Shipstead paper, a conference proceeding). I don't know how to prove that the file drawer problem is with the advocates except repeating this and pointing to the "false positive psychology" debate. – Ruben Jun 22 '12 at 09:22
  • They (or you :-) should also show an effect on latent factors, not residuals, so that it's clear that the near and far transfers are actually to the construct of interest, not to some peripheral property of it. – Ruben Jun 22 '12 at 09:56