Violent video games ‘help children focus’

CHILDREN who struggle in the classroom can improve their concentration levels with a “personalised prescription” of video games, including violent ones such as Call of Duty, a leading neuroscientist has claimed.

Dr Adam Gazzaley, of the University of California, believes doses of gaming should be used by schools to assist children with attention-deficit disorders, because they can benefit “high cognitive abilities”, including focusing for long periods and multitasking.

“Some of you might be thinking... that they’re just another manifestation of human mania, of just going after something relentlessly, after pointless goals,” he told an education technology summit in Salt Lake City.

“But even consumer level video games … the most controversial due to their high levels of violent content, the first person shooters, have been shown to have a benefit on high cognitive abilities – attention, working memory, task-switching – in young people.”

In a study co-authored by Dr Gazzaley in 2016, he found that children on a training programme comprised of 25 online cognitive exercises exhibited significant improvements in focus.

His claims are likely to divide opinion. Some academics say children suffering from ADHD and similar disorders are more vulnerable to becoming addicted to video games.

Professor Alan Smithers, of the Centre for Education at the University of Buckingham, said: “Other research appears to suggest quite the opposite, so this suggestion should be taken with a pinch of salt unless it is supported by randomised trials.”