Headline Feb 07, 2015/ ''' [TECHNOLOGY] IN HONOURS '''

''' [TECHNOLOGY] IN HONOURS '''

With most respectful and caring dedication to all the elderly in the world:

See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

''For  Every Voice''.

Dr Adam Gazzaley of the University of California wondered if playing video games would be more effective in exercising the brains of older people.

And, according to their research published in  Nature, that turns out to be so. 

AGEING  -is a daunting process,  -not least because some of the first things to fail are also the most useful, Such as:

Memory, attention and motor skills.

The idea that some form of regular mental activity   -doing a crossword, for example  -can postpone mental decline is not new.

Now researchers have found another: playing a certain type of video game could help the  elderly  stay sharper for longer.

Video games can be fun whether they serve any useful purpose beyond keeping some young people confined to their bedrooms is questionable.

In 2010 study thousands of volunteers spent six weeks playing video games but showed virtually no improvement in performance of cognitive tasks that were not related to the game when compared with non-players.

The players gaming skill improved, but the prowess did not extend to other cognitive areas.

Age, though, was not a factor in this study; most of the participants were in their late 30s or early 40s. So things might be different for other age groups.

So, Dr Gazzaley and his his team recruited more than 200 volunteers, whose ages spanned seven decades:

To play a video game designed specially to use  multi-tasking skills, which can be particularly testing for older folk.

The participants who had healthy vision and little prior gaming experience, used a hand-held controller to drive a car following a line on a road. 

At the same time they had to pay attention to signs that would appear above the car.

As they played the game, the brain activity of each participant was measured by a cap fitted with electrodes.

The first set of experiments, which involved those aged between 20 and 79, found, not surprisingly, that the older participants had to put more mental effort: 

As measured by their brain activity, into their game than younger people.

In other words, they found multi-tasking harder.

In the second set of experiments, a group aged 60 to 85, got to take the video game home and play it in an adaptive mode    -as they got better at the game, the game got harder-

For three hours a week over a month.

And to that, here, I add a great para from some new fiction:

Given this history it is unsurprising  that Mr David Vann is so adept, in ''Goat Mountain'',  at conjuring a world  where  rationality, as is known in the lazy. technology-driven 21st century- has no place,

Here the characters   -an abusive grandfather often referred to simply as a  ''thing'' : ('' a flesh of thing with no thought''),  a weak-willed but violent father, a friend who proves himself no friend-

At least within the rules of this dreadful game -operate by another, more primal logic  

The Honour and Serving of the  ''operational research''  continues. The elderly should consider putting away their knitting. And read up and join in.

With respectful dedication to all the Elderly Leaders of the world. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society.

''' Brain Training '''

'''Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless