Do Video Games Affect Our Brain?
Video games are blamed for anything - the bad influence on the psyche of children and adults, the escalation of violence, total insomnia, and the spread of the loneliness epidemic across the planet. Are these allegations fair?

About 25% of humanity on Earth plays video games. Gamers’ age has no boundaries - it may be the 6-year-old lad, and maybe the 40-year-old owner of a private company. Games are great entertainment that brings a lot of joy to their fans.

At the same time, there are a lot of rumors and legends around video games that spoil the good name of the industry. Schoolboy shot classmates - games are to blame! Children do not study well - games! Teens scuffle - games! Video games often become objects of unreasonable controversy, and today the science can dispel these myths.

Myth 1: Games make children cruel
The main complaint attributed to the games is cruelty. This mainly concerns the GTA, Call of Duty and Postal series. The latter has so often appeared in the media because of its gameplay features. Typically, these evidence-free accusations are substantiated as much as anything, apart from the controversy of various haters of video games. On the side of gamers, real scientific research, which is conducted by people in lab coats from around the world. The last study was conducted in early 2018 at the University of York. For the tests, they created two different games: in the first one it was necessary to dodge trucks, and in the second - to play for a mouse, which is saved from a cat. Next, scientists showed relevant pictures and made conclusions based on the reaction of the experimental. So, they tried to figure out the influence of games on a person’s worldview. It turned out that the proposed games had no effect on the subjects.
 
The second study took place in Germany in 2017. For four years, scientists conducted tests on Call of Duty and Counter-Strike players, which helped them determine the effect more accurately. In the end, they were also shown pictures of various cruelties and compared their reaction with the experimental subjects. It turned out that the two groups (playing and not playing) answered in exactly the same way.

The third study  also took place in 2017 but gave more interesting results. Psychologists of the American Association conducted a survey of 10 thousand Britons to form the desired picture. It turned out that gamers are more likely to read, go to cultural events and engage in creative work in their free time.

Also, experiments were conducted on 14 players in Call of Duty and Battlefield and 14 ordinary people. In the end, the two groups were shown a creepy and a cute image. As expected, the reaction was the same in both groups.

Myth 2: Games make people scattered
Often, video games are blamed for problems with underperformance or distraction in school. Like, they dull and make zombies out of children. I even had to hear such statements from my parents. I do not like to upset people, but this is also not true.

The study was conducted by Daphne Bavelier, a specialist in the study of the human brain. The study is very old, straight from 2012, but no less entertaining. Bavelier argues that action games expand the brain's cognitive abilities several times.  In another test, players had to track several moving points. The difficulty is that there are a lot of them on the screen and they are all the same color. The experiment showed that people who do not play games can track at the same time 1-3 points, while gamers - 4-6.

Scientists have found that the game affects several areas of the brain that are responsible for attentiveness: the parietal and frontal cortex. Tomography showed a great activity of these parts of the brain among gamers.

There are many other tests and they all boil down to one thing - games contribute to the development of the brain. Of course, CS: GO does not make you a genius but will help to improve concentration and attention, which will be useful in the study of science.

Myth 3: Video games destroy social links
It is also worth mentioning the social aspect, that is considered important in the modern world. Rumor has it that gamers are uncommunicative, sad and boring people who are completely alienated from society. I will not beat myself in the chest denying it, but just give you food for thought.
Each game has integration with social networks where you can share your achievements. Yes, this is done, for the most part, for marketing, but it is also communication.

In the same social networks, there are many groups in which players are looking for partners and friends to play together. There have been cases when people found their love there. Also, most of the multiplayer games have voice and text chat built in. Yes, as in real life, not the most pleasant people live there, but you still can find friends
Also, according to some studies, gamers are better prone to stressful situations and can quickly make difficult decisions. This is due to the need to quickly act on the fields of virtual battles. There are games like Dark Souls, where the slightest mistake costs your hero of life. So, the player thinks through tactics and learns to solve the tasks.

Myth 4: If you play a lot, you can strain eyes.
A very controversial issue in which the opinion of scientists and doctors strongly differ. In 2015, scientists from the University of Ohio published a study that dispelled the myth about the deterioration of vision from monitors.

The experiment lasted for 20 years and 4,500 children took part in it. The researchers did not find a link between visual impairment and a long stay in front of the monitor. They also note that visual impairment is associated with a genetic predisposition.

In turn, Daphne Bavelier found out that gamers can focus better on smaller objects and better differentiate shades of gray. At the same time, doctors strongly disagree with the research. They argue that during a long game a person blinks less, which dries the eye shell and receives minor damage.