To develop the mental faculties of your child, nothing is better than a small part of Mario Kart. We see you coming, out of the question! Yet this practice may well help your toddler in his future professional life. Indeed, a study conducted by the University of Glasgow in Great Britain has proved that video games have a beneficial effect on young people.
Improved communication and resourcefulness skills
The video games are not just eliminating targets or support stupidly over the keys of a keyboard in order to build an entire village. Videogame activities also have great potential for mental adjustment. The study, conducted by undergraduate students in arts and humanities, lasted 8 weeks. Divided into two groups, one intervention and one observation, the students observed and analyzed what the practice of a video game was doing during the two months of the intervention group experience . Over a total of 14 hours of play (which equals approximately 30 minutes of play per day), the tests showed that Strong improvements in communication, adaptability and “resourcefulness” were visible , in contrast to the group that had only been observing.
An asset for professional life
With the discovery of these results, researchers are even considering a video game job in higher education. Indeed, skills enhanced by the practice of video games are essential assets in studies, professional life and especially in adult life. The authors of the study also confirm the positive effects of video games on students’ adaptability and ingenuity.
These results, although very serious, are of course to be taken with tweezers. To obtain such results you have to choose the right games but also do not become completely addicted by monitoring the time spent behind the screens.
The video game accessible to children is often, or mainly, associated with consoles. Easier to access, more visible in pubs and catalogs, and giving access to almost all of the most popular games for children, from Sky-Landers to Mine-craft to Lego games. But the PC is also an interesting option, which offers a different experience. I propose, through a series of 3 articles, to examine the subject of the game on PC for children. PC or console, what to choose? Besides, should we choose? To play which games? Is the exclusive PC game possible? In this first article, let’s take a quick tour of the pros and cons of PC gaming.
Hardware: more expensive and more complicated, but more scalable
While a console, even recent, does not cost more than 400 € (and still very correct PS3 and Xbox 360 today cost less than 200 $) and allows to run in perfect conditions of fluidity all games expected for it, the price of a good PC adapted to the game is higher.
It is also much more difficult to navigate, as the possible configurations are numerous, and resellers unable to give readability. By buying a console, we have the guarantee that any game compatible with this console will work perfectly. With a PC, you run the risk of gambling that requires more memory, or a faster graphics card. Certainly, we will generally succeed in turning the game, but at the cost of a decrease in visual quality, sometimes to a point that is no longer acceptable.
