Surgeons Use Gaming to Improve Skills

The New York Times (registration required) has an analysis of several surgeons at Beth Israel Medical Center who utilize video games to improve their operating room hand-eye coordination. From the article: "The complex manual dexterity required to be a stellar video gamer and minimally invasive surgeon are strikingly similar, said Dr. Rosser, chief of minimally invasive surgery and director of the hospital's Advanced Medical Technology Institute."

Nothing new...

[Wraithfighter]

I"ve seen this kind of thing before, actually. Basically it was about how some kind of brain surgery that uses tiny robots to do the work, and how the surgeons were using video games as practice, so to speak.

The fact that video games improve hand-eye coordination and reaction time isn't anything new, its just that there haven't been a lot of applications for it.

Well, besides the military at least.

Most jobs rely on careful, methodical actions and thinking, rather than quick reflexes. So twitch games don't really boost many crucial job skills.

It is interesting that this comes as any surprise-

[Master_T]

It is interesting that this comes as any surprise because we have known forever that things of that nature improve hand-eye cooridination and reaction. Simulators are rarely even close to the real thing yet we use them. Not just because they train actions, but because they build up a pattern of reaction and expectation. In the same way, video games build motor-specific muscles and synapses that any reaction or hand-eye based activity can benefit from. True playing madden football isn't going to teach you to catch, but it could certain help you to improve your cooridination when using your fingers and thumbs. It is the same as suspecting that a talented pianist might be either quicker to learn, or quicker period, at typing.

I play a stringed instrument, but I was a gamer first, and my ability to play in tune and to use vibrato (place my fingers in the exact right place to produce desired pitches and vibrate my fingers back and forth to create a warm sound respectively) is much better than average and is sometimes better than the abilities of those who are overall much better players than I. I don't think it is a coincidence that I am a gamer and I was quicker to develop skill at precision movements like these.

Alpha and Beta brainwaves

[FirienFirien]

I read an article somewhere reputable (no idea where, it was about 7 or 8 years ago now) about computer gamers and enhanced skills. The factors involved were

Coordination - better than average fine motor control skills (small-scale precision), but average large motor control (eg swinging the entire arm to a point on the wall)
Tracking - gamers can track on average around 8 items in their field of view simultaneously, more than the general average of 5-6
Concentration - staying focused on a task without distraction for (sometimes significantly) longer times than average.

The study had worked with brain scans to test alpha and beta brain activity levels - alpha waves are indicative of more automatic control, beta waves are more complex. A link had been found with the skills listed above being seen in computer gamers; the gamers were far faster than average at settling from beta to alpha waves when introduced to an activity.

The article finished off by mentioning the groups most likely to display alpha patterns - Transcendent aspirants (eg Buddhist zen masters), Sportspeople who get to The Zone (intense physical activity, all pain is completely suppressed - very useful), and high-activity computer gamers.