From pixels to choices: Understanding the influence of video games on decision-making skills

IF 2.8 3区计算机科学 Q2 COMPUTER SCIENCE, CYBERNETICS

Entertainment Computing Pub Date : 2025-04-03 DOI:10.1016/j.entcom.2025.100953

A. Martínez-Maldonado

{"title":"From pixels to choices: Understanding the influence of video games on decision-making skills","authors":"A. Martínez-Maldonado","doi":"10.1016/j.entcom.2025.100953","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In recent years, the influence of the use of video games on cognition has been studied. However, there is no agreement on the way in which they affect processes such as decision making. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to study the impact of habitual video game use on decision making from a somatic marker perspective. For this study, a total of 46 healthy participants were recruited and grouped according to their frequency of video game use: Frequent Gamers Group (FG; n = 20) and Non-Gamers Group (NG; n = 26). The decision-making from the somatic marker perspective was assessed with the Iowa Gambling Task paradigm. Total task performance (TTP), decisions under conditions of ambiguity (DCA) and decisions under risk conditions (DRC) were analyzed using Student’s <em>t</em>-test for independent samples. After analyzing the results, it was observed that the FG group performed significantly better in the TTP and DCA variables compared to the NG group. The results could be reflecting how the habitual use of video games could be influencing the ability to make decisions. Hence, this seems to be produced by the anticipated establishment of the somatic marker under ambiguity conditions, which favors more advantageous decisions in general.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":55997,"journal":{"name":"Entertainment Computing","volume":"54 ","pages":"Article 100953"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8000,"publicationDate":"2025-04-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Entertainment Computing","FirstCategoryId":"94","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1875952125000333","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"计算机科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"COMPUTER SCIENCE, CYBERNETICS","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

In recent years, the influence of the use of video games on cognition has been studied. However, there is no agreement on the way in which they affect processes such as decision making. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to study the impact of habitual video game use on decision making from a somatic marker perspective. For this study, a total of 46 healthy participants were recruited and grouped according to their frequency of video game use: Frequent Gamers Group (FG; n = 20) and Non-Gamers Group (NG; n = 26). The decision-making from the somatic marker perspective was assessed with the Iowa Gambling Task paradigm. Total task performance (TTP), decisions under conditions of ambiguity (DCA) and decisions under risk conditions (DRC) were analyzed using Student’s t-test for independent samples. After analyzing the results, it was observed that the FG group performed significantly better in the TTP and DCA variables compared to the NG group. The results could be reflecting how the habitual use of video games could be influencing the ability to make decisions. Hence, this seems to be produced by the anticipated establishment of the somatic marker under ambiguity conditions, which favors more advantageous decisions in general.

查看原文本刊更多论文

从像素到选择：理解电子游戏对决策技能的影响

近年来，人们开始研究电子游戏对认知的影响。然而，对于它们如何影响决策等过程，目前还没有达成一致意见。因此，本文的目的是从躯体标记的角度研究习惯性电子游戏使用对决策的影响。在这项研究中，总共招募了46名健康参与者，并根据他们使用电子游戏的频率进行分组：频繁玩家组（FG）；n = 20)和非游戏玩家组(NG；n = 26)。采用爱荷华赌博任务范式评估躯体标记视角下的决策。使用独立样本的学生t检验分析了总任务绩效（TTP）、模糊条件下的决策（DCA）和风险条件下的决策（DRC）。分析结果后，观察到FG组在TTP和DCA变量上的表现明显优于NG组。研究结果可能反映了习惯性使用电子游戏是如何影响决策能力的。因此，这似乎是由在歧义条件下预期建立的体细胞标记产生的，这通常有利于更有利的决定。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Entertainment Computing Computer Science-Human-Computer Interaction

CiteScore

5.90

自引率

7.10%

发文量

期刊介绍： Entertainment Computing publishes original, peer-reviewed research articles and serves as a forum for stimulating and disseminating innovative research ideas, emerging technologies, empirical investigations, state-of-the-art methods and tools in all aspects of digital entertainment, new media, entertainment computing, gaming, robotics, toys and applications among researchers, engineers, social scientists, artists and practitioners. Theoretical, technical, empirical, survey articles and case studies are all appropriate to the journal.