Most people play online games to take a break from the pressures of daily life. They’re not necessarily setting out to make friends or to boost their cognitive abilities. Improved mood, enhanced reflexes, and leadership skills may be the furthest thing from their minds when coming to their console, yet these are some of the most known benefits of online game playing.
Through regular gaming players hone skills that can be applied to real life situations, while also experiencing reduced stress levels.
Whether they be real-time strategy games (RTS), fighting games, casino games, party or survival games, players are rewarded with social, mental, emotional and sometimes financial benefits when immersing themselves in the world of online games.
Improved Mood and Stress Relief
Apart from being fun and entertaining, there is increasing evidence to prove that playing lots of online games can help relieve stress. Players who direct their creative energy into problem-solving games enter a flow state where they lose track of time, distracted for a little while from life’s worries and stressors.
Bubble Wrap, Paper Toss, Relaxing Puzzler and Candy Crush are examples of mood improvement games that are said to increase emotional awareness, trigger positive emotions and help people feel less anxious or isolated. Research studies have even validated Tetris, that old familiar, to maintain improved PTSD symptoms post therapy.
Easy to learn idle or incremental games like Cookie Clicker offer low pressure ways to pass time and relax. For little effort, these kinds of games provide a sense of accomplishment and reward as players climb levels with new features being unlocked with every success.
Games that feature challenges and setbacks that require players to keep improving fosters perseverance and resilience. Players learn to handle failure and to keep striving for success. They experience positive reinforcement when completing goals, a boost in self-esteem and mental wellbeing.
Rewarding players in real time for overcoming game challenges, produces the release of dopamine – the brain chemical responsible for regulating mood, memory and concentration. Dopamine is linked to feelings of accomplishment and competence that results in a more cheerful mood. It is also the reason for high return to player (RTP) percentages in many online games.
Enhanced Cognitive Skills
Online gaming has extensively evolved over time, creating more and more complex scenarios for players to contend with. Having become more of an immersive and interactive experience, gaming engages players in activities that naturally builds mental agility.
With studies about the effects of online gaming increasing almost daily, proven benefits continue to rise.
They include:
- Enhanced critical thinking skills
- Improved logic
- Executive function and planning skills
- Reasoning
- Deduction
- Enhanced memory
It is a known fact that repetition builds strong neural circuits that are important for long term memory. Studies show that people who repeatedly play online card games like Poker, or massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG) like World of Warcraft, boost memory by up to 15%. Players are rewarded for overcoming new and unforeseen challenges through taking calculated risks and relying on memory recall, strategy and logic.
So, whether people are spending time at online casinos like Jackpot Wheel or playing with others in a lively virtual landscape, executive and cognitive functions are constantly improving. Players learn to manage their impulses and improve on their mistakes as the game unfolds.
Improved Hand-Eye Coordination
Action video games, racing simulators, real-time strategy video games and fast-paced casino games all require a steady hand and a focused mind. Players require quick reflexes to respond to in-the-moment game prompts, forcing them to adapt to rapidly changing situations. Through staying calm, focused and restrained, they can meet unpredictable game twists.
Interactive games where players must consistently track multiple moving elements, requires heightened levels of focused attention, fast reflexes and an ability to quickly process information from their peripheral field of vision. It is the reason that those wanting to improve their driving skills are encouraged to ditch typical driving games and play FIFA20 instead!
Gaming interfaces from touch screens to controllers have evolved over the years into high quality equipment that are constantly being improved for real-time movement and reflexes. These help players develop accurate hand-eye coordination, precision and timing control as never before.
Further to this, it has also been shown that those who regularly play online action games generally perform better in information processing tasks related to language and cognition than non-players, and that playing video games could even become a treatment for people who struggle with hand-eye coordination.
Social Interaction
It may be counterintuitive to suggest that people have become more sociable through online gaming, however many attest to having formed friendships and close bonds with people they have never met in person but share meaningful experiences with.
When countries around the world went into lockdown with the Covid-19 pandemic, the online gaming industry experienced a significant upsurge in hardware sales and games.
Traditional meeting places like schools, universities, casinos, churches and libraries were no longer accessible. People took to their smartphones and keyboards instead, finding mental stimulation, engagement and community – both local and international – along with convenience and flexibility.
Since then, competitive gaming platforms that encourage community building and social interaction have flourished. Here disagreements are managed to foster team success and group goals are achieved under pressure. People in these communities build useful social skills by developing enhanced communication, collaboration, leadership and strategic planning.
Today, the opportunity to easily team up with and compete against others globally continues to make the online gaming experience more interesting and challenging than ever before. The social pay-off is that players within these communities establish connections and friendships beyond location, age and ability while mastering personal developmental skills.
Conclusion
Despite the sceptics, people from various backgrounds and cultures around the world are finding a collective sense of accomplishment, belonging, peace and purpose at their keyboards and screens that seem to evade many in real life, proving that there are a multitude of good reasons that online gaming is good for you.
