New research suggests that playing certain types of video game can sharply improve your visual perception.
The study found that ‘shoot-em-up’ style games that feature enemies that pop out of nowhere sharply improve attention skills.
Experienced players of these games are 30% to 50% better than non-players at taking in everything that happens around them, according to the report cited in Nature.
They identify objects in their peripheral vision, perceiving numerous objects without having to count them, switch attention rapidly and track many items at once.
Dr Daphne Bavelier, an associate professor of cognitive neuroscience at New York state’s University of Rochester who led the study said the games increase the brain’s capacity to spread attention over a wide range of events.
