JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

An increasing body of research suggests that video games confer various cognitive benefits and exhibit significant potential in clinical rehabilitation. However, the neural mechanisms underlying these benefits remain poorly understood across different video games.

Objective:

This study aims to examine whether different types of video games have distinct cognitive effects from the perspective of anatomical structures.

Methods:

We recruited 39 high-level First Person Shooter (FPS) players and 40 high-level Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA) players as the experimental groups, alongside 37 healthy individuals with no video games experience as the control group. High-resolution brain structural images were collected for all participants, and analyzed using the Individualized Structural Covariance Network (ISCN) approach based on Cortical Thickness (CT), along with Support Vector Machine (SVM) classification.

Results:

The results showed that, compared to the MOBA and control groups, FPS players exhibited differences in CT covariation between the auditory cortex and the frontal, occipital, and parietal regions, with greater covariation between these regions for longer gaming training duration. SVM analysis further confirmed that CT covariation in these regions could serve as distinguishing features between FPS and MOBA players. Additionally, long-term MOBA gaming experience was also associated with CT covariation in brain regions related to visual attention than controls.

Conclusions:

This study is the first to demonstrate that long-term FPS gaming experience is associated with the covariation of CT between the primary auditory cortex and multisensory brain regions involved in visual attention and sensorimotor processing. These findings may provide valuable insights into the potential use of FPS games for auditory and visual rehabilitation training and offer theoretical foundation for the selection of professional electronic sports athletes.