How Years of Gaming Weakens Brain's Ability to Problem Solve | Executive Dysfunction 

Interesting concept I’ve never heard of 😅. I used to mostly play more open decision games like Rust, do you think these sort of games have different impacts on your executive function?

I see that there us a lack of data into different genres and types of players.

@@williamstewart7399 This is not Dr. K, but I think open-ended open world games probably use a bit more open-ended problem solving, however games in general simplify the number of variables when compared to life. Games in general are easier to analyze and break down than life processes if that makes sense

@@HealthyGamerGG that makes sense, thanks!

Clickbaiting for a good cause

Lmfao 😂

this is an epic gamer moment

Gamers, rise up! Stop gaming too much lmao

Healthy gaming only

Oh I gotta reduce the gaming time from 10h a day to 9h 😅

That's funny, I've got ADHD, and after I lost my office job (which expected a huge amount of multitasking) my mum commented that I should get a job writing manuals. And I've written step by step lists for myself of regular tasks for days when brain won't do the thing

@@chadsteadman2604: It's not clear to me why a better understanding of the problem would scare you.

It's worth mention that correlation is NOT causation. Just because a lot of people with ADHD also experience Executive Dysfunction does NOT mean everyone with Executive Dysfunction necessarily has ADHD... AND likewise, not everyone with ADHD necessarily experiences any Executive Dysfunction. The science (academia as well as clinical) is still "out" on the debate of what actually causes Executive Dysfunction or ADHD... It's also worth a mention that we're still dubiously exploring the realm of Neuro-plasticity, that is, the brain's ability to "rewire itself" to perform when necessary. We're still advancing and learning all the time... It's entirely within the realm of possibility that you found a practice, by writing the user manuals, of teaching yourself the skills over and over... AND in that habit, you may have engaged the neuro-plasticity to change your brain and develop better executive functions... NOT to say that's necessarily what you actually did... BUT it's possible... so maybe. It's also possible you never had Executive Dysfunction to begin with... I mean... If there are people who can suffer Executive Dysfunction without being clinically diagnosed with ADHD, then there's likely people with ADHD who don't have Executive Dysfunction among their symptoms... I'm not there to observe you or your life... SO that's something you should take up with someone who knows you better than a faceless dude on the web... AND if you have managed to "beat" the Executive Dysfunction, more power to you. Go win that Nobel and help a bunch of other people learn to break abstract tasks down into "user manual" instructions for themselves... ;o)

SAME!

@@gnarthdarkanen7464 How can you be diagnosed as having ADHD and not have executive function problem since ADHD is an executive function deficit disorder (EFDD)?

I like games like Crusader Kings II because in that game, there isn't really a goal and you have to set yourself goals and the game doesn't tell you how you can reach those goals. You have to plan it out yourself.

Old school dungeon crawling games. Those sh*ts were tough.

Yeah true I suppose I didn't think of it that way because I am a history nerd . When I see the Roman Empire halved I gotta reconquer it or when I see the illustrious Abbasid dynasty in shambles I am obliged to establish its prestige . But I do notice people play ck2 in different ways and one notable way is RPing .

Yeah it's not the games' fault, it's our fault for not diversifying our hobbies. Yes I know games exploit us to harvest our time and money, so the company's do bear some fault when they intentionally seek to exploit us with behavioural psychology and intentional addiction functionalities, but the majority of games werent designed this way until the last 5-10 years

They don't respect your time, money, skill, or intelligence either. These AAA games that've been churning out the last 10 or so years are glorified Skinner Boxes.

@Nephalem - Exactly! I only resort to RU-vid or online guides only if I have spent HOURS trying to figure it out. That's better than just giving up.

I love this comment and agree. Figuring things out on my own is my favorite part. But I do want to point out a notable exception that was rather frustrating. Links awakening was my first zelda game I knew nothing of the series. The first dungeon has a puzzle with a door that won't open unless you push a specific block in the room into the right spot. Nothing indicates this I spent months banging my head against it before finally caving in and looking up a guide. Still salty about that. Rest of the game was great.

Yea I’m not wasting hours when I can find the answer online…time is money

I have a bad habit of searching walkthroughs before playing a video game. In a sense, it's like perfectionism where I don't wanna see myself fail so I gather all needed info to get through a game, even watching someone finish it from 0. I would usually get bored midway in playing that certain game cause I've already seen the ending, just like subnautica. I know it seems dumb but I can't get over this habit of mine

​@@superdupeninja8149hmm... then why are you wasting time playing video games?

That ghost ship had got me to my boiling point 😂

ya for a kids game they really made it hard to understand what to do.

sigma male right here!

Put this in your resume.

I got Omega Ruby for my daughter and I told her the goal of the game is to get the 8 badges and beat the elite 4. She kept asking me for where to find things how to progress and told her I’m not going to tell you where to find things because when I was a kid I had to wander around the map asking people things till I found what I needed. She’s got all 8 badges and is working in the elite 4 right now with little to no help from me and I couldn’t be happier. Same with Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze I told her I’m not going to beat levels for her or anything and shes working it out for herself. I have to remind her to take a deep breath and think about the solutions you’ve tried so far when she starts to get frustrated. Sometimes it helps and sometimes I have to tell her to take a break.

when you end up looking online because you realize youre not smart enough anymore to figure it out by yourself - thats truly the worst

Isn't that still problem solving tho? You went with the easier solution but you still solved rhe problem.

@@ashishshenoy3778 There's nothing wrong with looking stuff up. Sometimes games just aren't well designed.

@@alienstales But you took the thinking process out which is critical. Probably better to think of a possible solution and then compare it with the answer to see where the mistake is.

@@alienstales I don't think Googling da question is Problem Solving.

what's awesome is every once and a while somebody will know your paralyzed. I have had somebody turn an open ended issue into a do this in this order and it's a mindfuckening. but it just works. I have learned to just do what I can and if there's a problem somebody will let you know. now that being said you can't do that for everything and anything. don't just run into no man's land because you got shell shock in ww2. unless your trying to get shot. I guess what I'm saying is success in video games is always unorthodox. so instead of valuing what everyone else does, flip the game on them and you can win. how do you flip the game. use what you know about other usless shit, we all know you got enough in there to make a dent. for ex. geometry has taught me how to square certain things in construction without the need for conventional tools, it saves money and time. this Is why I think gamers can do closed ended better than average. we are used to speed running for reward. not the other way around.

Oh God I have this and I didn't even know about it until I watched this video.

I‘ve been trying to get myself to talk to a therapist about that but I just can‘t get myself to make an appointment. Meanwhile I‘m failing college classes because I play games instead of attending class. It‘s so frustrating and I just don‘t know how to get out of this loop...

@@iworkforwendys For me it does affect me pretty bad, I’m in the military and I can honestly say it’s affected my career negatively.

@@falion2850 you are overwhelmed by your problems. Take it slow,step by step. Cleaning your room should be enough at first. Maybe take a 5 minute walk after that. And after some time has passed, 1-2 month or so , the last exercise is, change behaviour. Start the day with a cold shower for example, train yourself to be more spontanious.workout at home and go more outside, biketour, jogging, e skateboard. But dont try to force it, you have to make a deal with yourself. You will feel much better if you once get the bad behaviours out of your system and only game if there is time for it. I went from 8 years wow player who played dayli 10 hours to 4 hours a week max, my trigger however was my frustration. It got so big, i could no t bear it anymore so there was never a conflict inside me after that point was reached. I wasnt happy with myself and i couldnt life like that anymore, i just didnt want to anymore. And if i can make it, you can too. Just dont lose as much time as i did. I am 35 soon and there is still so much i havent done yet, like sailing or world travel and such things.

my submission for the games that don't handhold category would have to be Warframe....

Waqas Rabbani Warframe? is it a good game?

IDK maybe just that less creativity needed to problem solve

@@JustAPakistaniGamer Idk, I like warframe and I would recommend it, but there's not a whole lot of depth or interesting decisions to be made once you're somewhat into the late game. My personal best recommendation currently would be path of exile, but you HAVE to stop following guides once you're familiar with the game and start experimenting with the new stuff and changes they add every 3 months on your own. There's lots of cool interactions to discover with every new league, I find it incredibly fun and you'll shit out tons of currency if you figure out the new stuff yourself, but if you're just waiting for guides to come out and copy them, it'll just be a mindless and not very rewarding grindfest, so don't fall into that trap.

No no Modern games are actually BETTER at expressing open ended problem solving due to increased variance in some titles Older games while not telling you WHAT to do. Only had one or two ways to do things whereas modern games can have a massive variance in games like dark souls

That's a good argument when i play warframe i have to take time ,math statistics and problem solving in consideration and the sequence of Action i'm going to take ,but most popular games like COD and CS:GO Just requires me to shoot faster than my enemy

@@gandalf_the_purplewithredd2057 Right. His example of Genshin Impact is basically glorified gambling hidden under an action RPG façade. I don't think that's a good example of the depth that many video games offer. Videogames is such a broad term now, much more than books or movies. A videogame can be a visual novel, a cinematic experience, a strategic war game, a frantic twitch shooter, an artistic and creative tool, a gambling time-waster, an emotional music-driven exploration game, or even game-making within a game itself. You can't just say "video games" and have any point make sense for all these types of interaction.

@@AlexanderArts I agree ,but it's worth to mention that it's hard to find actually good and different strategy and thinking required games because it's easier to profit from a simple shooter with no New mechanics or original thinking ,not going to blame the developers though it's business you do what keeps you alive

@@gandalf_the_purplewithredd2057 Uhm, i dont want to sound ridiculous, but i think that simplifiying cod and csgo like that is wrong tbh. Csgo is considered by many to be a some sort of "chess with guns", and cod somewhat requires strategy as well (not as much as csgo, but some). Also, they both require you to think fast, otherwise you'll lose, and csgo also reaquires muscular memory (aim). Thats all have a nice day 👍

@@josepedrogaleanogomez4870 Yeah, I was thinking the same. You can see players plan ahead their rounds in CS considering their income, the rest of the team's economy, etc. Basically, the shooter game goes alongside a resource management game for competitive matches. It's daunting to learn, but fascinating to look at to say the least.

Well, motivation is like, emotional energy. And what seems to cause low emotional stamina is a dopamine deficiency. (That's why ppl who have a hard time focusing can still play video games, because they are continuously immediately rewarding.) Dopamine deficiency is to executive function as mana & xp debuff is to being underpowered for a stage. Or maybe more simply: Lacking the energy to learn skills at the same pace as others.

@@Goddess_Moros very insightful. thank you!

Dopamine deficiency based executive function impairments is broadly labeled as "adhd" and affects upto 10% of people. Adhd is a terrible surface level term, like calling autism "hand flappy syndrome". People with adhd are on a spectrum, like people who need glasses. Some can function without glasses if they choose and others would be near blind without them. Luckily, adhd is extremely treatable with medication and I would recommend looking up Dr. Russel Barkely on RU-vid as there are excellent videos about how to treat it, variation between medications, and how to structure an environment where someone with adhd can succeed.

@@KILLCHRISU of course! I've been working on figuring out all this stuff I maybe dealing with so I have looked into it a lot.

@@jeremyjackson7429 Well, good for them. If someone has to compensate for their disability and that compensation develops into a skill, who would put that down. Still, that's one person and if you look at studies of groups of people then you will see how terrible it can be for some. "Adhd" is cause by underproduced & overabsorbed dopamine which means total daily emotional energy is dropped and everything in life is relatively less emotionally rewarding. This lack of energy to self direct is dangerous but treatable. - Unmedicated people with adhd have a 30% increased chance of dying by an accident. - Adhd is the most well medicated mental disorder. Proper medication having an effectiveness of 1.6-1.8 out of 2 (8-9/10 life changing improvement.) Just those two facts alone would make the point but I can keep going.

I have an action figure (Goku from Dragon Ball Z) which I carry around to explain my thought process to. It is as if I'm not able to break tasks down into chunks without speaking them out loud. Talking out loud to myself doesn't work in my case, but talking to a prop actually works. It's weird for a 24 year old man to talk to a doll. But hey fuck me right, if it works it works.

@@user-sk8lj1vw4r Programmers will often talk to rubber ducks to help find subtle problems hiding in the steps of their code! I've found that talking out each step, whether with a friend or a plush, helps me break down a task and "instruct" myself to identify each piece and get it done.

@@GGreenHeart didn't know that, thanks for the insight!

Ive sort if noticed that as well. I’ll be in the middle of working on a song, and i know that i have to do X Y and Z to finish the song and get it ready for release but, i end up just listening to what i have at the moment and just sit there staring lol

@@user-sk8lj1vw4r The cardboard consultant!

Holy shit it's the Koala Kontrol!

cap fact check what he says before believing this shit

you are not koalafied to be on this plane

Uh i'v kinda been just passing this off as a really bad procrastination problem i think? Talk about a new meaning to soul draining games xD.

I think more than video games online schools are making students brain dead I mean I my school they teach accounting by dictating like srsly these so called "veteran teachers" have no pation in their job and don't give a fuck about students even after getting paid a decent amout of money it's just sad

LMAO

my thoughts exactly

Sounds amazing

I think more than video games online schools are making students brain dead I mean I my school they teach accounting by dictating like srsly these so called "veteran teachers" have no pation in their job and don't give a fuck about students even after getting paid a decent amout of money it's just sad

Wait... Your teachers get paid in monkeys? Holy shit. I wanna visit! @@abhinavaditya3516

When I was working on my master’s degree, the thought of writing a 75 page master’s thesis was paralyzing. But the reality of it is, you don’t sit down and write a 75 page paper; you research, brainstorm, look for problems or indiscrepancies, break your ideas into sections, and write one sentence at a time. As long as you keep doing it, eventually it gets done.

Learning programming has similar effects. You break down a complex task into simpler problems and then write exact instructions that a machine can pragmatically follow.

This!

Bro you literally spoke into existence the words for my own personal issues as an artist and aspiring writer. Not wanting to sound like an idiot even though the ideas are concrete in concept the actual words used is another thing all together. It’s almost like the fear of failure. Like you feel almost like you need a prior writing portfolio to prove your capable of pulling off your own first novel.

@@silentobserver888 That's because I once had aspirations myself. I've had a few decent ideas that could make for what I always thought could be nice stories, but actually getting the words on paper is hard. That, and focus was never my strong point lol. That doesn't help either.

That’s a very good way of putting it.

Executive disfunction is not a lack of knowledge, but a lack of volitional ability to do what you know you need to do.

"Competing swarms of bees" resonates with me. I refer to it as 'butterfly brain' when it happens. Like, my brain just flutters around, occasionally stopping at a flower for a bit, but most of the time is spent slowly going from flower to flower, transitioning between tasks but not actually on task for most of the time.

How? My thoughts are a urologist would be good at Urology not optimizing flow of a urology clinic..

@@D_Jilla I think it was a pun on the usage of *flow*

​@@sandsalamand3763 Ahh! that makes sense! lol i can see that going over a lot peoples heads

i have felt this exact way for two years now and in the same situation, people really don't know the real struggle to not be able to do what you have to do, but im glad that im not alone

Hope you’re in a somewhat better place!

I thought I was alone. Strangely enough, reading your comment is conforming. Hopefully this video has the information I need desperately right now.

@@cavemann_ did it?

Yeah living with adhd my whole life (which just is another story really) and executive dysfunction is something you just gotta reconcile with. It's there and it's going to stay, some days it's easier to deal with it, some not. Meds help if you're lucky, lucky to find a proper doc or just because of how your body received the meds. Many people have no idea how hard it is to live with it and they blame you for being lazy or so...no Jannet, I may be a bit lazy, but even not doing things I love like art or gaming because of executive dysfunction should tell you a lot. It's like a constant struggle in my head.

@Daniel that hits deep. Cries in unemployment at age 25 😭

Try meditating while concentrating the most you can in not thinking every morning. It will improve your day-to-day concentration.

@@markusoreos.233 I think meditation is useless for ADHD people

I think the opposite. ADHD people are to benefit the most from meditation as long term practice increases dopamine supply that is lacking in ADHD brains. But it may be more challenging / frustrating for people with ADHD at first

Seems logical. Programming essentially is constant problem solving.

for me making music likely had. like music production is basically just one giant puzzle. what sounds work with what you make, how do you make everything fit together, etc.

Just thought about this. I'm also a programmer but I feel like my executive functioning is still not leveled up so much. It might depend on the way I'm programming. Because yea programming is a constant problem solving but if literally only google and let google tell me what to try and what to do its not leveling up very fast. But if I am really aware of the problem and try to find a way to solve this problem before I spam random google searches then my executive functioning could propably benefit way better

@@simon-wt Yea i see what you are saying. In my case it probably helped that I have a formal education in programming, where programming without google was incentivised for the first two years.

100%. I was thinking the same thing

Possibly but I’d lean towards it causing it. I don’t remember having any of those issues as a child but definitely can recognize the impact of playing a ton of games throughout my youth and into my adulthood. Who knows maybe it’s both but I just got into games because they were fun.

as someone who's been playing games since 5 (now 31) and having went through and gained control of my executive disfunction, i'd agree with you. what caused my ED was depression coupled with trauma. therapy helped me get back my life, and i gamed about the same all over the course of my life so far. Gaming is simply an escape. it provides a source of dopamine when you can't rely on the tasks you should be doing for it.

@@user-zq9su8jv2k seems like you are projecting, as he didnt even insinuate watching porn or something similar.

I think it depends what kinda game. Games that reward you for anything and don't require much problem solving will most likely make you dumber. Games that require you to think and solve things yourself could actually increase. Like baba is you or technically terraria since it's a game with no actual goal and you just explore unless you're using a guide. Since guides honestly throw out any type of thinking out the window.

Might be a reason to enjoy different games as well

"If you fart in the wind you only give it one option to move in" -Niels Bohr

"Clean your Room". (Ludwig the Holy Blade)

Thats actually bullshit😂

Definitely agree. I do that too while studying something that i find difficult or that i dont want to do, i start reading it out loud as if I'm teaching a class. Works wonders

hands down agree here

It's called echo chamber or some sort of echo. The same way people do to strengthen their memorization of this particular thing by saying it out loud or repeating it in the head over and over again

Talking outloud is one of the strategies that we use in our childhood to organize thought, plan our actions, guide our behavior etc... This private speech can also be used as a tool in adulthood for the same purpose, although more often than not we internalize it and it turns into another form of thought. If you are interested in reading more about it, check out Vygotsky and his work surrounding the relationship between thought and speech. There's a lot of authors who have studied this relationship besides him, such as Chomsky, but Vygotsky is the one who pretty much created this field of psychology.

cant count how many times I've noticed myself "ok so since we did this NOW we're gonna do this"

I think a lot depends on the game and how much moderation is used. I think there are problems for kids or adults who spent years playing the same game without learning any adulting skills?

I'm assuming it really depends on the type/genre of game, I was thinking about this as well. Some research on how different genres work different parts of your brain would be really interesting to look at

40 year old gamer here been gaming at least 4 hours a day for the last 22 years and i make decisions very fast and solve problems even quicker.

@@RemOmni which game(s)?

World of Warcraft for 12 hours a day addictively is the type of gaming I believe is the level of gaming that is doing this I believe

Which is not gaming's fault. If used properly gaming could help us on the Spectrum "practice" for real life in a safe space

@@IntoxicusFreeman I definitely agree that some games can be beneficial for practicing long term planning. It's the more linear stuff that holds you by the hand that tends to weaken that ability.

@@cdiessner711 Sure, but that is a lot more nuanced than "How Years of Gaming Damages Brain's Ability to Problem Solve" because that means it's not gaming alone as a broad and that context and nuance matters. You could say the same about any media. Mediocre fluffy media of any kind without substance is not going to be of much value. And media of any kind that has substance and density can be of great value in many ways. Replace "media of any kind" gaming and you should understand my point. At the end of the day it's not the tools fault if people use the tool poorly. The tool simply "is." It's how people use it and in what context that matters.

People who don't have autism won't get it, but I get you so much! 🥺

Ghost Bush: what am I supposed to do if I am 23 and completely stunted, paralyzed, anxious and concerned all the time? The worst part is that I know in my heart that I'm not worthless or unintelligent, socially is where I struggle the most. I began isolating intensely during 2020 and withdrew from college due to overwhelming uncertainty and loss of motivation. I thought I was passionate about wildlife conservation biology, and I absolutely love nature and being "out there" exploring and admiring natural beauty. I don't know where it all fell apart, but I felt overwhelmed by the math courses and just couldn't handle it. I can't navigate the abstractness of calculus without someone holding my hand. I may have had imposter syndrome when I was in college as well, which made me feel like I just didn't belong in the class with these intelligent driven people. I don't know if I have executive dysfunction. I do know that I haven't been able to push myself to get a license and try to move out one day. I've been on my computer almost constantly since losing my brother 2 years ago, with no true friends or connections. I have a lack of clarity and motivation, (I should do x, but I want to do y) and so on. I am overwhelmed and I feel trapped in my head. I am so lonely too. 😭 💔

Genshin Impact is also not as easy as he makes it out to be. Artifact management and team composition is also, in a sense, strategy. Of course I get what he's trying to say but I feel as if he generalized games a bit too much.

The Witness

Postal 1 and 2

@@InjusticeJosh In all of these you have a single goal and a set of possible things you can do. This is gamer thing

@@saniel2748 You’re right it still puts you in a very controlled environment. I just wanted to represent for a puzzle game which I thought was pretty great and very difficult.

Place a rubber duck on your desk and pretend you're talking to the duck. It's a well known software development technique.

I just talk to my dog

I often talk to myself when solving problems as well, or at the very least have internal dialogue.

I do it alot and get shamed for it from my mom, but I can't think as effective if I don't

I don't know why people take offensive to people talking to themselves. When people ask you just say, "I talk to myself because its the most intelligent conversation I've had all day".

Also makes sense as to why they say that teaching things to others actually helps you learn those things better yourself. And it's why teachers should always use positive reinforcement. Good on you for training your dog and also for you helping yourself improve!

Damn i used to think like that when i was younger too, now all those things seem so small

I just thought I had anxiety but make sense

One thing to add: it doesn't improve with just age - but with practice.

_"I've gotten really good at breaking tasks down into their components but I still struggle with executing those basic tasks."_ This is the reverse of what this video is discussing, actually. You can think of tasks but not do them, gamers are the other way around. _"while playing witcher 3 I was thinking and wishing my life could be like a game: being able to do all these challenging and cool things, completing quests, "winning" at life without this constant mental struggle--always being told what to do next."_ Having the tasks written down and prepared is great because you don't have to think about what to do anymore, it lets you use your mental energy for other purposes. Also, performing tasks in games is slightly easier than in real life, which is another factor. If you have CPTSD all you're describing may be caused by a sort of "permanent" _brain fog:_ it's difficult to think and concentrate, to remember the short term goals & tasks, and everything seems harder than it should be because of constant lack of mental/executive energy. It's not that you're lazy, you actually have it harder than normal people if this is the case. It's not _you,_ it's brain fog. There are a few mechanisms by which brain fog may be induced, like vitamin D & Magnesium deficiency (these two are strongly connected) (or was that vitamin B12 and others too?), or inflammation in the brain, or some auto-immune response in the brain, or some fungi. Generally speaking PTSD brain fog comes from the brain being stuck in fight & flight response, so amygdala keeps firing and frontal lobes activity is decreased or something like that. But maybe dealing with the specific mechanism that applies in your case can help with the brain fog even before you deal with the trauma. Well, checking your vitamin D & Mg levels can certainly tell you where the lack of energy comes from. But as always on this channel, _meditation_ helps if you keep doing it every day. Like, it _actually_ helps. What is your depression and anxiety caused by?

The research is correct, however games often offer instant gratification which long term instead makes solving problems look more daunting and thus makes the issues much harder than what they really are.

Starting to sound like the diet wars.

i just don't have any motivation or attention to follew these quest through.

Reading quest thoroughly doesn't improve your problem solving. It's the same thing.

i recently bought dragon quest builders and honestly it was such a struggle at first for me as someone who suffers with extremely poor executive functioning because you’d have to build things without as much instructions as to where things should go or how it should be built outside of basic structuring. Overtime it started getting easier as i was able to figure out how to plan out where things should go, how it should be built, what i needed in order to craft certain objects and where i needed to go to find them and it’s reflecting on the way i plan in real life now lol.

@@filiplaubert5001 Nope but there are times where you need to figure things out yourself, there are puzzles that need attention to detail

@@filiplaubert5001 Ever played old Ultima games for example?

May i ask who OP is? :)

@@MyXrayz no, you may not (Original Poster)

i got you , 4chan user : )

@@Eldiran1 OP is not exclusively a 4chan term

Feel that pain. It is important my friend. You’re emotions are valid and valuable. Yes it is challenging because it’s supposed to be but YOU WERE BUILT FOR THIS. I love you my friend.

Bro, I can assure you with my body, soul and everything that surrounds me that in a certain way thanks to the bad moments I have progressed and even being very, very selfish and proud I have realized that I was not being myself and things that little by little I want to achieve

Me too. I'm not young either. Turning 28 in two months and have nothing in life. No skills no friends, never a romantic relationship. Lived my whole life never being enough and wondering why I was born wrong. I've missed everything in life and I'm way too busted to even attempt getting them.

@@crazygorillaxyt u dont need to feel the pain u just need to let it be and not get to u like it once did

@@megaultra5005 I essence that’s true. ... in the moment of a trauma yes, you may feel the most intense pain but as you feel through the pain and even years later are still feeling it in a different way different than the experience of it, It’s important to feel through that no matter how intense it is. especially after the trauma has already happened. Not just not feel it. Because it is still an emotional response to that trauma. And if you just tell yourself to grow up than that is a nother way of emotional bypassing / coping. whenever emotions come up they must flow through you however they do, or else it’s gonna be bottled in. The only way to heal is to feel. It starts with feeling than building awareness and action into overcoming. In your message it was kind of hinting towards what I’m about to write. As you feel more of your pain, overtime you know how to deal with it more. And you’re able to work with it and through it more groundedly.

Because its generic, since the digital space nearly effects everyone

Outer wilds is a gem

Yes! Minecraft specifically is a game that's recommended to kids for this exact reason. Though these kind of games are really the exception, there's very few of them out there.

@@Vazio3 add in mod pack like Ftb and you are gonna suffer if you don’t know how to break things down.

Now I know why I always end up cheating in that kind of games

Factorio can actually swing violently in the opposite direction once you figure out "arbitrarily extensible layouts" such as the main bus or city blocks. This generally degrades the game into a "checklist simulator" feeling, but it can take many hundreds of hours to sorta "see through the matrix" and realize that instead of organizing things, you're more just deterministically generating a list of all the things that must be done (which many players do semi-automatically using a tool like Helmod) and then just doing them one after another. It really turns into a "have Helmod write a guide and then follow it" game. Breath of the Wild is kind of an oddball because you sorta don't have "macro goals" at all, except in the Divine Beast sequences (and probably Hyrule Castle too, I never got around to finishing the game). Instead you just kinda...do the thing that you're doing right now, and then it's done and you find the next one. You don't know what the next one is or how to find it, but you don't really need to, because if you wander around you'll find something to do.

Same and I remember my mom congratulating me when I built them like they came out of my own mind or something…

Yeah, it's kind of weird hearing about it. I generally have a really good grasp on problem solving and regardless of the fact that I've gamed HARD throughout my life. And I'm talking about playing 60 hours plus a week. The only bad things I have in my life are more or less have nothing to do with gaming, and are a reason why I was playing games so much.

I was thinking this same thing I play fighting games close to competitively as I can get and it's some hard stuff man. There's so much to it all and it's very discouraging

If you "chunk" a nebulous goal into smaller tasks, you can get gratification every time you complete a small step

@@jogold867 Sadly not for people like me. I don't feel rewarded from completing a task. It's like a hollow victory

Yeah, I think there's way more to executive function than this video gets into. Chunking tasks is just one part. There's also impulse control, focus, goal-setting, time management, memory, patience, adhering to deadlines, etc etc. It's like: I know the steps to wash the dishes and clean my house but i still have trouble doing this tasks. I know how to chunk them but I still experience action paralysis, procrastination, distraction and other issues

@@spongebobislyfe5906 tbh if i like doing something in a game its bcs of the process of it, most of the time i dont rlly care abt the reward system, even if i do the fun wears off fast

@@lees2404 Was thinking that while watching. I dont think my paralysis when wanting to shower, or take out the trash, or even play a game I enjoy is due to an inability to operationalize a task. When a task is that straight forward and I still struggle to get it done, it must come down to impulse or something like that.

Facts, when it comes to video games, it needs to have creativity easter eggs that can make you choose different options. It makes you more...how do we say that in english ressourseful? Creative?

Agreed. Needing to tell the player how to do everything just tells me the game designer/developers couldn't come up with more than one way to accomplish that task. They don't want you to attempt something they didn't consider and frustrate players so instead they railroad you. Better to give a tutorial on all the basic mechanics and some idea of what's possible for future leveling decisions, then let the player trial-and-error their way through the game.

What is the way to solve it?

Any luck?

Maybe try to play some grand strategy game like europa universalis IV , Victoria III or even game like The new serie hitman . These game doesn't take you by hand (you have to avoid easy mode in hitman and try to play in hard ) and you have to choose what you want to do , based on what you know and what you can do . We ,as gamers , need to go out of your confort zone more often . Games who are experimental , who doesn't take you by hand , who force you to think , to redefine how to play , are the one i want to play (and i'm lucky they are a lot of them ). Of course , to be honnest , i also play some more casual game like "hunt:showdown" (who isn't really casual to be fair ) ; after hundred of hours of gaming , i know the weapons , the sound of them , the map , nearly perfecly , and even if i have to reajust my knowledge of the game constantly du to the multiplayer nature of this game ,even with new update , i'm not in a complete unknown area know .

He doesn't care, he's a streamer. Accurate information comes second, views come first.

Well said.

@@AA-rh5ee the statement just sounds extremely pessimistic

@@D_Jilla It's true. Never look at a twitch streamer of all things for education or real value. They're here to get paid for entertainment, that's all. Sometimes they do this via slightly more productive ways (politics/therapy/whatever), but make no mistake, it's all about the moola.

@@AA-rh5ee sure I'll agree that ppl want to make a living off streamimg. If you I think this applies to Dr. K then you don't know dr. K... he's not a streamer and he doesn't do this to make money nor does he need to. In fact he spent a lot of money on healthy gamer. So just because there's some truth their statement doesn't mean that belief it's true. That's why I say it's purely pessimism / cynicism

You are not alone, It's super depressing

Factorio.

Eh, I'd say From has history of making very bad tutorials that are thinner than paper. They actually improved it a lot more than just messages you'll see once in your playthrough in Sekiro where you have Hanbei the Undying to use a sparring partner or punching bag if you need to train without having the game hold your hand.

@@arceuslegend4605 which isn't the game holding your hands, is it incouraging you to test things and figure out new things for yourself, which means, make you thing way beyond what the game straght up tell you.

The Witness: no explicit tutorials, free exploration, hard puzzles, hidden puzzles. I felt fairly smart when I solved the greenhouse.

@@Lestibournes i haven't played that game, but i play a lot of fighting games, and let me tell you, many fighting games have horrible tutorials, and even the ones with good tutorials still require you to think way beyond what the tutorial tells you, it's a good exemple of a geme that won't harm your problem solving capabilities.

Hmm. Now that I think about it...it really does seem to be that simple. Truly pathetic. How I can't do anything even though it should be so easy.

I think the key is recognizing that there is no ‘minimum size’ for a task to be broken into. Sometimes for me, it helps to even write down the tiny steps, like ‘write a sentence about what I think it is that I need to do.’ Sometimes just in that process I’ll realize something I hadn’t.

It obviously depends on the type of game. Plenty of games are good for exercising the brain.

Profile pic checks out

@@SweatySockGaming Thank you for noticing :)

Even more with Age of empires / other strategy games. For me games that are intellectually challenging arent fun for me so i think im immune to this

See the bright side. At least u didnt do drugs or alcohol, which is even worse

Is it really "cleanable" huh? I've ruined myself to no measure, and disappointed my younger self, and I feel like there's no use of me anymore, so I keep playing instead of getting back on track for once.

​@@arcyine Look man, I'm in the same boat. I don't know how old you are, and I don't know your life, but just so you know for the sake of context from my personal position I'm 22 and my big mess up is that I utterly bombed my first year of collage back in 2018 (which was also my first time living on my own) and ever since then I've felt sort of those same feelings you expressed here. I spent so much of my childhood only focused on my grades and nothing else, then in the span of one year I feel/felt like I threw away everything that I had spent the majority of my life sacrificing my social skills and mental health for. Now I certainly don't got all the answers, and I'm also just some random person on the internet, but I thought I should share that one of the tings that keeps me going is the simple fact that I still live and breathe. As long as you still live and breath, you can still do good, you can still carry on and pursue life. There is still time. henyou'reyou are easierpracticing. trying again for the wall of text and massive amounts of projection.

one question: are you sure they do?

Kill guy, loot, kill another guy, loot, win. All u need is a monkey brain with good aim

@@DrakesdenChannel eh, it's still REALLY basic stuff in the grand scheme of problem solving tho EDIT: ha, ha, really funny. since it's obviously edited i should explain what comment i replied to originally: it was about borderlands being a looter shooter that requires a lot of problem solving because weapons have different stats and you can attack enemies differently.

@@captasticts8419 Agreed, those are baby's first conundrums

Explains how Orcs Must Die is very engaging to me , but I no longer have any interest in RPG or puzzle games anymore. I used to love planning for a character and practice for boss run as a kid.

well some dont and are actually recommended by doctors to help with mental problems. For example destiny because it has problem solving with missions, exploration, raids, dungeons ect.

@@PowerK1 No I'm saying that the absurdity of it triggered me because it's contrary to half my life experience, not that it's wrong. It just means it didn't work negatively for me.

video supports that games help with problem solving, it just weakens a different form of problem solving. Hope that makes sense. Apologies for the title - we have to be general in some parts because of the character limit.

@9λ what do those two things have to do with each other?

@@HealthyGamerGG Nah it's ok, the triggering is just a joke

@9λ doesn’t mean you still can’t get anything out of it that won’t be relatable to your life I’m Not a porn star and got something out of the advice given

Can you explain why / how

Prepare yourself! I really like chess.​ @@Malthaell_ In relation to this video with executive function, chess is all about finding the best moves in a position. What your opponent should do, what you should do, what effect a move will have later on, and keeping track of the entire board. It's not always clear what to do and it's up to just you to figure it out. Problem solving, planning, and reasoning. To quote David Bronstein, "the most powerful weapon in chess is to have the next move." For me personally, I used to be supperrr unfocused and distracted. I got really into chess for a few months and it helped me a ton with learning to focus, as you really need to focus on the game to improve, and not tab out. It was super engaging for me personally too, as I had a bit of a transition with puberty from hyperactive all over the place to a more logical and thoughtful approach. Hit me at the right time. It was one of the first more mentally-healthy hobbies I picked up for my mind. It introduced me to an awesome community and I love chatting to people from all over the world while we engage in a mental battle. There's quite a bit of research out there on the positive effects of chess, especially for ADHD, but this has just been my personal experience and I have not looked into it much.

@@FieryFighter I don't have ADD, but I can agree that learning chess has definitely done a lot for my way of thinking. I think it has to do with how one develops as a player. You start out just moving based on the current position, in one dimension almost. Then slowly but surely once you practice you start visualizing your pieces' potential follow up moves, and boom. Knights, the beginners' most neglected piece in my experience, go from those weird pieces you mostly ignore to disgusting fork machines. I think it subconsciously trains your ability to consider situations holistically with due care to even non-immediate consequences of actions.

9:47 So, in actuality, No Game No Life?

It still applies to the vast majority of games, though. If you take an open-world RPG, a management game like Stardew Valley or something super open-ended like Minecraft, once you have a basic understanding of the game, whatever your goal is, things are relatively linear in the sense that it's always a pattern of "unlock this by unlocking this, which is unlocked by gathering this and building this". Even if you have an idea for something creative, the execution is always very straightforward. Executive function in real life has a bazillion other things to take into consideration, like your social and physical environment, you emotional state, your physical condition, your resources, and most importantly the insanely vast array of unpredictability that you will never find in a game, because games have limits in the number of curveballs they can throw at you. It's not systematically linked to videogames, but the human brain has the amazing capacity to shape itself in response to its environment; if it doesn't need to push for a strong executive function because it's used to years of navigating in a virtual world where the rules are constant and outcomes predictable, it won't waste energy developing said executive function anymore than necessary.

@@XiprofteQC sure, in a game it's reduced and simplified but even in the games you mentioned it's not linear. You still gotta pick out a goal and plan out your next moves to fulfill the requirements. The games themselves take great pride on their NON LINEAR and OPEN ENDED nature (it's usually in the box). If you think doing a thing to achive another is linearity, then real life is linear too. Linear means no choice, no branches, a single line from beginning to end. Heck, I went on Minecraft for a year and never got to underwater exploration, as I got sidetracked building and laying down a minecart track to connect our two castles. Not exactly an intended goal of the developer, huh?

@@XiprofteQC The 2nd paragraph was basically me playing Starcraft 2 trying to manage workers, resources, supply, scouting, attacking, etc. The only limit to the curveballs is how many my opponent is able to throw. Not to mention games like Teamfight Tactics. Unpredictable? Whole game has a layer of RNG on it and you're managing resources, position, team composition, etc, and your emotional state? Tilt is a word in gaming for a reason.

Doubly so, I think it really only applies to those who lack the faculties to play a game skillfully... I will often play FPS games that people assume are 1 dimensional (such as Call of Duty) and do things in them that make people go "how did you think of that?". The mistake that is always made by people who are casual or are on the outside looking in is that while the variables are defined and the world within which you can act is small enough to understand in its entirety, there is still room within this context to challenge yourself and for a lot of gamers, games are the only things that make them challenge themselves. To me, this type of generalization about games is too limiting and it actually has no scientific proof either... just a psychologist giving an opinion.

@@XiprofteQC someone made a working computer inside minecraft.. And thats just one example, there's a million more, reducing it to "unlock it by unlocking this" is ridiculous.

@Renegade I just started taking antidepressants, because I didn't have cognitive or physical energy to function. When I was studying for the Step 1 exam, I was actually spending about 8-11 hrs a day on it, but I think this was one of the reasons why I developed depression in the first place. Sometimes, psychological deficiency and lack of support could just transform into biochemical disorder if given enough time it seems. When I was studying, I had the same understanding as you - just go with the flow, just do this and that, don't be excited yada-yada. But this is simply unhealthy and is a recipe for disaster for your mental health. In regards to the US interviews: this is partially a misconception. Connections in the US will positively affect your chances, but a lack of them won't negatively affect your match. Especially if you're a foreigner, nobody expects you to have acquaintances there.

So how’s the game doing ??

@@willegg8436 it has some fundamental problems, that I may never be able to work out; but the process of working on it has helped me learn and grow a lot

Faaaacts

They are meant to be popular and addictive and too difficult to get the next dopamine rush,but if they would be different nobody would care about those

Very well said, man.

The channel has clarified in a comment that gaming helps closed-ended problem solving but reduces open-ended problem solving.

@@ehqwk I see the comment. I quite disagree. Still no sources and a link to buy his stuff...

@@PersistentDissenter the man is a doctor, has a family, and still puts in the time to do youtube, twitch, discord. its comical how you think he's ignoring your comment. not everyone has time to sit in youtube comments all day. congrats on your research btw, maybe you should teach at Harvard like Dr K.

@@rymo5681 Are doctors always right? Did I ask for a direct response? Does he never personally respond to comments? Did he teach at Harvard or just have his residency there? Do you often attack people who disagree with your views?

@@PersistentDissenter no, i was just putting it into context. sorry if i was rude. you acted like you were entitled to sources. so on every one of his videos that he gives his opinion on, does he need to go find sources on what he said? a lot of what he said is from his schooling and personal experiences. how is he going to source that?

Gaming doesn't cause ADHD - ADHD is a developmental condition, it's genetic and starts from a young age due to how the brain develops. People with ADHD tend to be drawn to gaming probably for some of the reasons talked about in the video. I don't like how the video claims gaming makes executive functioning worse, because I don't think that's true. It's likely the other way around that ppl who struggle with executive functioning are likely to enjoy games and excel at them bc, like he said, we're good at closed problems. A lot of people with ADHD need meds. These days there are a lot of different medications to choose from tho and you may be able to find one that has few to no side effects for you and that you can tolerate better than what you have taken in the past or are taking now.

@@lees2404 yup, exactly.

So much this. I consider myself a highly organized person, but Genshin Impact threw me for a loop. There's just so much to do and so few resources to do it with. Leveling characters requires careful planning even if you are just a casual player. Edit: Grammar (of course)

This, I have honestly nothing more to add, it requires much tactics and learning, plus of course planning

This is why i always love logistic, survival, puzzle/maze games like Minecraft, Satisfactory, or Hollow Knight. It makes me wander and plan my next moves

optimization is a reflection of how perfectionnist you are thats why u cant achieve real goals

Genshins ez 🤡