New research explains why men are more likely to get hooked on games than women.
Men are more likely to get hooked on video games than women because they appeal to the conquering caveman in them, new research suggests.
Scientists at the University of Stanford hooked up men and women to an MRI scanner to test brain activity as they tried to win on-screen territory by clicking a series of balls.
Both sexes showed activation in the brain's mesocorticolimbic centre, the region typically associated with reward and addiction.
Male brains, however, showed much greater activation. The amount increased as they gained more territory.
Professor Allan Reiss said that women understood the game but were not as driven as men.
"The males were just a lot more motivated to succeed," he said. "These gender differences might help explain why males are more attracted to, and more likely to become hooked on, video games than females.
"I think it's fair to say that males tend to be more intrinsically territorial. It doesn't take a genius to figure out who historically are the conquerors and tyrants of our species - they're the males.
"Most of the computer games that are really popular with males are territory and aggression-type games."
The researchers designed a game involving a vertical line (the "wall") in the middle of a computer screen. When the game begins, 10 balls appear to the right of the wall and travel left toward the wall. Each time a ball is clicked, it disappears from the screen. If the balls are kept a certain distance from the wall, the wall moves to the right and the player gains territory, or space, on the screen. If a ball hits the wall before it's clicked, the line moves to the left and the player loses territory on the screen.
While we're not sure a game where you click a series of balls to win on-screen territory has much to do with any game released in the last 20 years, Dr Reiss said the findings may apply to modern day video games.
"This is a fairly representative, generic computer game," he said, adding that he and his colleagues are planning further work in this area.
SOTT
SIGNS
OF THE
TIMES
OF THE
TIMES
Welcome to Sott.net
The World for People who Think
Now people are digressed back to Darwinian theories and types again! This negative, narrow, impoverished, backwards explanation of people and their behaviors justifies "law of the jungle" laws applied to modern living!
I think men are "programmed" to win by culture, not genes or the "cavemen" in them! Males are urged by culture, thus society, to be "dominant" throughout their entire lives.
The Bible doesn't help, either. It condemns gays and non-traditional people (usually kinder, gentler people) while it foists a macho god and macho male image for males to follow.
Territory and aggression traits of males? This sounds psychopathic to me! This sick kind of thinking and behavior keeps the world in locked in the grip of evil!