Playing of Call of Duty Can Assist You in Improving Your Driving Techniques
Playing of Call of Duty Can Assist You in Improving Your Driving Techniques
"You can improve your driving skills by playing video games." Those words are likely to conjure up images of Gran Turismo or Forza Motorsports in your mind. When it comes to teaching players the mechanics of driving, particularly when steering wheels and pedal controls are employed, are these games the most effective at improving driving abilities?
However, studies have revealed that first-person shooter games such as Call of Duty, which are designed to simulate driving, actually benefit drivers more than driving games themselves.
A common benefit of video games is the improvement in eye-to-hand coordination, which is one of the most obvious and frequently mentioned. Even though it appears to be common sense, it has almost become a cliché in debates about the positive and negative effects of video games, and it continues to be a source of disagreement despite its apparent common sense.
Video games have come a long way since the days of the Atari 2600, which had a single joystick and a single button. Players will now have to contend with gamepads that are equipped with dual joysticks and a minimum of 12 button controls.
Some players who have grown up with the evolution of controllers may find modern devices intuitive because they have spent their entire lives interacting with the complex input mechanisms. The development of their eye-to-hand coordination has begun at a young age for them. Is this, on the other hand, a direct result of gaming or is it a result of the surrounding environment?
Playing action-packed video games, such as Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed, does not appear to improve sensorimotor control, according to a 2014 University of Toronto study. Gamers were found to perform tasks with a "consistent and predictable structure" better than non-gamers, indicating that gaming enhanced sensorimotor learning.
Both groups were required to keep the cursor within a white square while it moved around on a computer screen, which was how the researchers determined this. At first, both groups performed in a similar manner. The results showed that gamers made significantly greater and faster progress in keeping the cursor in the square than non-gamers as they practiced.
Maintaining a cursor within a square on a computer screen may not appear to be a good way to become a better driver, but it actually does so. It is not about the action on the screen, but rather about what is going on in the brain that is important. Cognitive functions and visual acuity are the most important factors to consider. It is directly related to situations in which a driver must make a split-second decision in order to avoid an accident that he or she can recognize the direction of the square and then reroute the cursor before it leaves its confines.
A Study Conducted In Toronto
Call of Duty and similar games can help you improve your driving skills, according to a 2014 study conducted in Toronto. A professor of brain and cognition sciences at the University of Rochester, Daphne Bavelier has spent the majority of her professional life examining the psychological effects of video games. She has gained some interesting insights into how players react to action video games.
In a 2012 TEDx Talk, Dr. Bavelier debunked the long-held belief that playing video games is harmful to one's vision (watch below). However, despite the common belief that spending excessive amounts of time in front of a screen is detrimental to one's vision, Bavelier asserts that this is simply not the case. They measured the eyesight of gamers and non-gamers in the lab and discovered that the former consistently had better vision than the latter – even those who played up to 15 hours per week had better vision than 20/20 vision, according to the researchers.
Players not only have improved visual acuity, but they also have a more refined perception of grayscale, according to research. Dr. Bavelier uses the analogy of driving through fog to illustrate his point.
According to Bavelier, "the other way in which gamers excel is in their ability to resolve various shades of gray." "Assume you're driving through dense fog at night. A split second difference can mean the difference between seeing the car in front of you and avoiding or being involved in a collision."
According to her research, another myth that contradicts her findings is that playing video games causes increased attention problems and distractibility. Scientific research into attention has been going on for decades, and there are numerous standard tests that can be used to measure it in a quantifiable way.
Bavelier discovered that Call of Duty players pay far more attention than non-players when they are playing the video game. They used a straightforward test in which they showed test subjects colored words and asked them to identify the color of the ink that was used to write each word as it appeared. Certain words caused a cognitive conflict in the listener's mind. In this case, the word blue would be written in red ink. The findings revealed that gamers were significantly more adept at resolving those conflicts than those who did not participate in the game itself.
Another attention test requires the participant to keep track of multiple moving targets. The average person can keep track of approximately three or four different objects at the same time. Players of action video games have an attention span of approximately six to seven minutes. Because of the time commitment required to play action games like Call of Duty, particularly during hectic multiplayer matches, these findings are somewhat predictable. That's a good thing, given how many browser tabs we need to keep open in order to have a chance at winning a new graphics card these days.
When driving, the ability to pay attention is essential. When driving, keep in mind all of the variables you must consider, including the cars ahead, behind, and beside you; children playing near the street ahead; traffic signal color and intensity; your own speed; and the speed of cross traffic approaching a green light (if applicable). It is necessary to maintain concentration while driving because there are numerous factors to consider. And laboratory tests have shown that action gamers perform exceptionally well in this area.
Practical testing conducted with the aid of brain imaging
Bavelier's research confirms the findings of practical testing conducted with the aid of brain imaging. Three areas of the brain are involved in the regulation of attention. The parietal lobe is in charge of directing one's attentional attention. For the most part, the frontal lobe is in charge of maintaining attention. Finally, the anterior cingulate cortex regulates how we distribute our attention and resolve conflicts, among other things.
According to Bavelier, "When we conduct brain imaging studies, we discover that all three of these networks are significantly more efficient among people who participate in action games."
This brings us back to the debate over whether these findings were directly related to playing games or were the result of a variety of common environmental factors. Fortunately, Bavelier took into account causality, which can be tested in the laboratory with relative ease.
Through the use of a controlled training study, Bavelier and her colleagues were able to prove causality. They started by giving participants cognitive tests to see how they would react. The subjects would then spend the next two weeks playing ten hours of action games in 40-minute sessions, which would take place every day. When the subjects completed the same cognitive tests again, the results revealed that not only did they perform better, but the improvements continued for a further five months after the tests were completed.
It is clear from the training tests that two things are true. In the first instance, they demonstrate a causal relationship between the visual and cognitive improvements associated with playing video games such as Call of Duty. The positive effects are not a result of the gaming environment in which they occur. Second, it demonstrates that brain training through the use of these games has long-term consequences.
A 2016 study from Shanghai demonstrated that playing high-action games physically rewires the brain, implying that the benefits are at least partially permanent. The researchers were interested in determining whether or not playing video games could improve one's practical driving skills in real-world situations. In addition, they wanted to see if the type of game made a difference in the results.
