SHT - Computer games can stunt kids' brains

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NationalPost.com

August 20, 2001

Computer games can stunt kids' brains Japanese study

The Daily Telegraph

LONDON - Children who play computer games for hours on end risk stunted brain growth and a loss of self-control, research has shown.

A study found the thought processes required by computer games are too simple to stimulate crucial areas of the brain, leading to underdevelopment and behavioural problems such as violence.

Professor Ryuta Kawashima, of the Tohoku University in Japan, said the greatest threat from computer games is not in their tendency to arouse aggression, as previously thought, but in the lack of mental stimulation they provide.

Mr. Kawashima and his team measured the brain activity of hundreds of teenagers while they played a Nintendo game and compared it to another group doing simple arithmetic.

The results showed that, unlike the math exercise, the computer game did not stimulate the brain's frontal lobe, an area that plays an important role in the repression of anti-social impulses and is associated with memory, learning and emotion. A lack of stimulation in this area before the age of 20 prevents the neurons from thickening and connecting, thus impairing the brain's ability to control impulses such as violence and aggression.

A more highly stimulated and thus more developed brain is able to keep such urges under check.

Speaking at a learning conference in Britain on the weekend, Mr. Kawashima said: "The importance of this discovery cannot be underestimated. There is a problem we will have with a new generation of children who play computer games that we have never seen before. The implications are very serious for an increasingly violent society."

Tonmoy Sharma, of the Institute of Psychiatry, said Mr. Kawashima's theory is supported by other studies. "Computer games do not lead to brain development because they simply require the repetition of simple actions and have more to do with developing quick reflexes than carrying out more mentally challenging activities."

Mr. Kawashima's study also found reading aloud is very effective at stimulating the frontal lobe.

-- Anonymous, August 20, 2001


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