Portal 2 Better than Brain-Training Software, Study Finds

If there’s one thing people can agree on, it’s that video games affect people’s brains.  The debate generally stems from people asking HOW: some believe they cause aggression, violence, anger, and distorts people’s ability to tell right from wrong.   Others argue that they’re helpful, enhancing cognitive abilities and being more useful teaching tools than traditional educative practices—some even go so far as to say games don’t cause aggression, rather, they bolster confidence.

The debate rages on, but thanks to a study done by the psychology department of Florida State University, we have another voice in the latter camp.  See, a university researcher on the psychology of education, Val Shute, was playing Portal 2 and had a thought: "I was really just entranced by it.  While I was playing it, I was thinking, I'm really engaging in all sorts of problem-solving."

So inspired, she began a study of the game, comparing it to a popular brain-training program for adults called Luminosity.   And what she found was that eight hours after playing Portal 2, 100% of subjects studied showed better improvements in standard cognitive tests over those who studied 8 hours with Luminosity.  Or, as Shute put it, "Portal 2 kicks Lumosity's ass”.

Now, it’s obviously not a perfect system: Luminosity is designed to be used for long periods of time, while Portal 2 takes all of a good session to finish start to finish.  Additionally, as far as gaming as a medium goes, it’s not actually that large a step forward—after all, Portal 2 was designed to be a brain-bender, I don’t doubt Luminosity is a better brain training program than Battlefield 4.

But it’s still informative, and hopefully it will be cited for the game-training of the future.  It’s easy to see why a game, designed to be fun, would be more engaging for people and make them more interested in training themselves, so if we could combine the best of both worlds, presumably we’ll all become hyper-intelligent paragons of existence?  Here’s hoping.