Action Video Games Sharpen Vision by Twenty Percent

Video games that contain high levels of action, such as Unreal Tournament, can actually improve your vision.
Researchers at the University of Rochester have shown that people who played action video games for a few hours a day over the course of a month improved by about 20 percent in their ability to identify letters presented in clutter—a visual acuity test similar to ones used in regular ophthalmology clinics

In essence, playing video game improves your bottom line on a standard eye chart.

"After just 30 hours, players showed a substantial increase in the spatial resolution of their vision, meaning they could see figures like those on an eye chart more clearly, even when other symbols crowded in."

At the outset, the students were given a crowding test, which measured how well they could discern the orientation of a "T" within a crowd of other distracting symbols—a sort of electronic eye chart.
Students were then divided into two groups.
The experimental group played Unreal Tournament, a first-person shoot-'em-up action game, for roughly an hour a day.
The control group played Tetris, a game equally demanding in terms of motor control, but visually less complex.

After about a month of near-daily gaming, the Tetris players showed no improvement on the test, but the Unreal Tournament players could tell which way the "T" was pointing much more easily than they had just a month earlier.


SOURCE:
Physorg.com

This is a very interesting finding, and one which I can personally
understand, as I have actually noticed that in myself.

It is interesting to see how video games are being found to actu-
ally have many positive benefits, especially after the period of last
year where there were a few studies linking video games to nega-
tive things.

So, the next time someone tells you to quit playing video games
because they're bad for your eyes, you can tell them they're wrong.


Comments, Opinions?

[edit on 2/6/2007 by iori_komei]

Have you ever wondered how someone playing Halo 2 on a 13inch TV could ever snipe you from across...I forget the name...used to be named 'Blood Gulch'. That's because they can focus more on you than a novice could. My motor skills and reflexes are better than that of a person who plays only racers. I am also athletic...so that could be another reason. But as far as detecting movement and seeing detail...videogames help

Ah-ha, a multigeneration class of Snipers for the future ,

but, being realistic (i say to myself) this visual acuity & hand-eye quickness
drill using video games, was not a diabolical scheme.
this is coicidence, just when the military needs snipers & remote control pilots for campaigns in the near east & middle east,
or else there's a higher power at work ...yeah, right

I play action and RTS Games for about 2-4 hours a night every night and my eyesight certainly isnt better... its never been worse!

Admittedly, my hand eye coordination is dastardly good as are my reflexes based on sight and sound- but in terms of actual vision computer games have been a deadly blow.

I noticed this too. I played the origional perfect dark with a friend. I never have played the game before and he played it all the time. To me the pixilation was too much and I couldn't see anything at long range. He how ever was sniping of enemys on the oposite side of the map. This goes to show that video games tend to train your eyes to see and track detail that you couldn't see and track before.