[HN Gopher] Playing video games can help to reduce stress and an...
___________________________________________________________________
Playing video games can help to reduce stress and anxiety, and
improve mood
Author : neomindryan
Score : 199 points
Date : 2023-03-27 14:08 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (cscaz.cansurround.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (cscaz.cansurround.com)
| aaron695 wrote:
| [dead]
| christkv wrote:
| Playing the remake of Resident Evil is definitively not lowering
| my stress and anxiety lol.
| qaq wrote:
| Based on the title alone I thought this would be about
| programmers and ChatGPT
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Me too. This has been precisely my coping mechanism: Lean in
| and _try_ it.
| qaq wrote:
| same thing :)
| [deleted]
| r3trohack3r wrote:
| I thought this was going to be an article about optimism
| ("geeking out" as in getting excited about things). I acknowledge
| that I'm responding to the headline and not the meat of the
| article.
|
| I've recently (past ~5 years) stopped viewing the world
| pessimistically. I don't believe it's because I'm blindly
| optimistic, but because I didn't have the perspective to
| understand our ancestor's problems and how good of a life I had.
| It's pretty cool that I didn't die in 6th grade when I put that
| knife through my hand, that my knee doesn't lock anymore after
| having my meniscus removed, and pretty cool my wife survived to
| adulthood with unbelievably poor vision and asthma. It's pretty
| cool that a large portion of living is automated now by the
| systems around us, from food to cleaning, and that those systems
| are affordable enough that they're common place in most
| households. We've freed our societies up to focus on arts and
| science which has created a flywheel that keeps paying us greater
| and greater returns that we keep investing into arts and science.
|
| Humans have done some cool things to conquer our basic nature and
| environment, and we continue to do cool things. Compared to other
| species we are absolutely killing it. Yes we suck compared to
| what we are going to be in the future, but that's the point!
|
| Whenever I get a brief feeling of "this is bad," I remind myself
| that humans have conquered far worse than whatever "this" is and
| that we are likely to triumph over this thing too. Taking a
| second to appreciate what our species has accomplished, and
| "geeking out" about it, has helped improve my quality of life,
| thought I'd take a moment and share that with you.
| onemoresoop wrote:
| > Humans have done some cool things to conquer our basic nature
| and environment, and we continue to do cool things. Compared to
| other species we are absolutely killing it. Yes we suck
| compared to what we are going to be in the future, but that's
| the point!
|
| At the same time it's important not to forget humans have done
| some messed up things to the environment that are not easy to
| clean up or undo. And they still do, all with a paltry goal to
| make a short term profit. This is what drives my optimism away,
| though I am not a pessimistic person by nature.
| r3trohack3r wrote:
| I have a longer response on another sibling.
|
| But I'd say:
|
| 1) Most humans mean well and these are side effects of
| solutions to other problems - we can find and hold up
| examples of people acting poorly but to extrapolate that out
| I don't think is fair. Energy abundance has done unbelievably
| important things for civil rights, quality of life, and the
| prospect of life being able to outlive Earth.
|
| 2) It's important to remember life on earth is ~75% behind
| us. We've only got another 500m years until there is a
| complete extinction event with little hope of coming back. If
| you take humans out of the picture, you don't save nature,
| you doom it to complete extinction.
|
| Humans are awesome, all flaws considered. We are the only
| golden ticket our planet has printed to get life off this
| rock.
| 411111111111111 wrote:
| > _Whenever I get a brief feeling of "this is bad," I remind
| myself that humans have conquered far worse than whatever
| "this" is and that we are likely to triumph over this thing
| too._
|
| I do something very similar, though slightly different.
|
| Whenever I notice something bad i rejoice that I've probably
| lived through the best times our western society likely ever
| have
|
| I at least experienced a reality which didn't have [the bad
| thing] as the norm.
|
| Society is not gonna get more equal from now on, so Gen Beta
| (people that are currently being born) are gonna have a
| massively worse life then I've had.
| spoonfeeder006 wrote:
| Have we had to handle anything as bad as global climate
| change which can possibly render much of the lower latitudes
| near inhospitable for humans?
| e_i_pi_2 wrote:
| This is somewhat true but also somewhat not - we have a lower
| chance of childhood mortality, but only in some countries. We
| have a general higher standard of living, but income inequality
| is worse than it's ever been. We have less people dying in
| wars, but when we do have them more people die than ever would
| have in the past. I'd recommend "The better angels of our
| nature" as a book for more on this - it covers human history of
| this well and shows the tradeoffs we've been making at the same
| time. The average person today has more creature comforts than
| a king a hundred years ago, but at the same time almost no one
| today has as much vacation time as a medieval peasant did
| pathartl wrote:
| There are a few people in my circle that are overburdened by
| conspiracy theories to the point where they think that humans
| are corrupt and everyone is out to get them. It's exhausting to
| live like that. My goal is to be my 13 yr old self's hero. Do
| cool stuff, be in a good relationship, and fix things that
| bother me to the best of my ability.
| TMWNN wrote:
| > There are a few people in my circle that are overburdened
| by conspiracy theories to the point where they think that
| humans are corrupt and everyone is out to get them.
|
| The Trump presidency's existence broke a lot of brains on the
| left.
| PeterisP wrote:
| Indeed, for many people on both sides it was (and is!)
| quite a shocking revelation that in their surroundings
| there is a _huge_ number of people who don 't just disagree
| on opinions or facts but have completely contradictory
| values, one side praising that which the other deems as
| clearly, obviously evil, and vice versa.
|
| I'd argue that this comes from a change in media - where
| previously you had a clear consensus either in the small
| community you lived in earlier times, or country-wide with
| the advent of mass media, and even if you'd disagree with
| that, then you still can't avoid knowing what the
| surrounding reality was; but now with personalized social
| media, so many people get a _false_ impression of the
| actual social consensus around them, because they
| communicate much less with people around them but rather
| communicate in an "information community" which is larger
| geographically (often global), and which is different from
| the actual community where they live and which makes laws
| for their life; so they perceive that the "community
| standards" go one way (in the way which their "online
| information community" thinks) but then reality crashes in
| with something totally different, and this does "break
| people's minds" in some way.
| pathartl wrote:
| These people I'm referencing generally lean more towards
| libertarian or anarcho-capital.
| hutzlibu wrote:
| And those left people then started believing in Q and drank
| desinfection to cure covid?
| eldritch_4ier wrote:
| To be fair there are way more leftists who think trump is
| as bad as hitler as there are conservatives who believe
| in the Q stuff. Most conservatives don't even understand
| what Qanon even is other than a catchall for "conspiracy
| theories".
| TMWNN wrote:
| The non-crazy right laughs at, ignores, or (as
| eldritch_4ier said) mostly does not know what "Q" is.
|
| The left's equivalents to QAnon get 17.5K upvotes and
| 2.5K comments on /r/politics, articles in _The Atlantic_
| , and nightly _IT 'S HAPPENING_s on Maddow.
| birracerveza wrote:
| Weird take, I've seen nothing but seething insanity from
| the right ever since Biden got elected.
| [deleted]
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| Remember how, just a few months ago, one could get banned
| from Social media for suggesting Covid-19 originated in a
| lab? "Fact Checkers" were hard at work silencing that content
| and attributing it to "conspiracy theorists".
|
| Now the lab leak hypothesis is mainstream, with experts
| supporting investigating the labs in Wuhan and bringing in
| evidence that the disease indeed originated in a Chinese lab.
|
| Sometimes, it seems the difference between facts and
| conspiracy is 6 months or another presidential
| administration, whichever comes first!
| skyyler wrote:
| This is the stuff that is exhausting.
|
| Why focus on it? What good does it bring to you?
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| "Why keep looking at the stars through these telescopes?
| We all know the Earth is at the center of the Universe,
| the Pope said so. What good does it bring to you?"
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| It's reality.
| skyyler wrote:
| And in your day-to-day life, how does a deep
| understanding of the psyops being run against you and
| your countrymen do anything to help?
|
| Knowledge is for action.
| skeaker wrote:
| I mean, it was an unfounded conspiracy theory before,
| wasn't it? When new evidence came about then it shifted
| into legitimacy. That's just how evidence works.
| mustacheemperor wrote:
| Viewing this sort of issue as equivalent in personal
| magnitude and meaning to Galileo's heliocentrism dispute
| with the renaissance church is exactly the perspective I
| seek to avoid by framing my mindset like the earlier
| commenter, personally.
| jahsome wrote:
| Hear hear! Our current and 13 year old selves sound like we
| could be a lot alike!
|
| I'm really doing my best to make past/teenage me proud. I
| know about 5 years ago, I'd probably have kicked my own butt.
| zokier wrote:
| > Whenever I get a brief feeling of "this is bad," I remind
| myself that humans have conquered far worse than whatever
| "this" is
|
| It's a nice sentiment, but I see no reason to think it is true.
| While I'd agree that in many ways life is nicer and easier, the
| problems that we do have now are even more complex and
| difficult than ever.
| Damogran6 wrote:
| You're still above ground after a global, full-blown,
| pandemic. Which is nice.
|
| The things that bring me the biggest anxiety all come from
| Twitter, and I find they don't much impact my day to day.
| While the internet shows me the absolute worst of mankind (in
| addition to the best), I find my IRL world isn't half bad.
| si1entstill wrote:
| I feel like I am and always have been a "day-to-day" optimist,
| but I struggle to apply that to larger, societal problems.
|
| Our impact on the environment is measurable and the impacts
| look dire. Income disparity seems to be increasing locally and
| globally. The military industrial complex of the largest
| nation-states feels eternal, as if it is a fundamental part of
| neoliberal capitalism.
|
| I can "half-full" almost everything day to day. Financial
| issues, medical issues, family problems... never easy, but
| doable. I can handle it, smile on my face, and tough it out.
| But when I'm left alone with my thoughts, its hard for me not
| to draw the conclusion that the world my children (or their
| children) grow up in will be worse-off, and they will live
| harder lives than we have.
| fauxpause_ wrote:
| Is the military industrial complex really that big? I'm under
| the impression that it's honestly pretty weak and fragile.
| PeterisP wrote:
| Yep, the current Russian war in Ukraine exposed the fact
| that the western 'military complex' isn't that industrial
| anymore, as (for example) the total _annual_ production of
| artillery shells is less than what we 'd shoot in a single
| average day of WW2.
|
| There's still a lot of money spent, but it's spent less on
| actual industrial capacity but rather mostly on various
| high-tech R&D things - probably because then you can
| convert a larger portion of the order to profits instead of
| hardware.
| fauxpause_ wrote:
| Yes that was what I meant. Lots of RD. probably an army
| of contractors.
|
| But industry? I really don't think so. Still curious if
| others have evidence otherwise
| r3trohack3r wrote:
| We made it through a cold war. Previous generations had to
| live with the very real risk of a fast escalating total
| nuclear disaster. We still have nukes but I generally don't
| worry about a fast escalating "everyone launches everything
| they have and we are ill prepared to shoot them all out of
| the sky before they make contact" doomsday scenario. Not only
| did we make it through that, but we put humans on the moon
| during that window of time and humans made some pretty
| significant scientific advances with the backdrop of all that
| stress.
|
| > Our impact on the environment is measurable and the impacts
| look dire.
|
| Humans are pretty resilient and have been pretty good at
| mitigating large scale problems. Yeah we are impacting our
| environment, but we aren't the only species that does this.
| Many species, left unchecked, go through natural boom+bust
| cycles where they blast past the carrying capacity of their
| ecosystem and then bust the next generation.
|
| At no point do deer look around and go "hey, we are eating
| all the food, maybe we shouldn't do that?" - they just eat
| and reproduce and nature sorts it out. They aren't morally
| corrupt for causing a boom/bust cycle, they're just animals
| like us. However, when it comes to humans, we have blasted
| past our ecosystem's natural carrying capacity (we've been
| past it for a long time now). Not only do we look around and
| go "hey, this is a problem" - something that puts us in a
| league all our own - but we have repeatedly solved that
| problem. And now we get to tackle the next set of problems.
|
| Simply being aware that we are responsible for climate change
| and the ending of the Holocene is a huge achievement for a
| species, let alone putting together plans to over come it.
|
| That is pretty cool!
|
| What's even cooler is that all of the growing pains we are
| going through are putting us on a trajectory to literally
| save all life on Earth. Folks like to kick around the can
| about how humans are destroying Earth's environment. That's
| true, and we need to work our butts off to keep everything
| balanced moving forward. There are very smart humans working
| very hard to keep our ecosystems from collapsing.
|
| But, no matter what we do to save our ecosystems, we are over
| 75% through the window of time life can survive on this
| planet.
|
| A world without humans is a world where Earth slowly moves
| out of the habitable zone and finds itself in a complete
| extinction event in ~500m years - with little to no hope of
| any life bouncing back.
|
| Getting life off this planet is a noble cause. Doing that
| requires either:
|
| * a biological pathway to interstellar travel beyond the
| micro-organism scale (maybe nature will produce this in 500m
| years? find that _exceptionally_ unlikely)
|
| * a species to develop the technology to get itself off this
| rock and survive the extremely hostile environments in space
|
| Humans are doing that latter, and I have no reason to believe
| any other species would do a better job than we have getting
| to "building rockets and settling planets." Not only is our
| species going to the stars, but we are going to bring life on
| Earth with us when we do.
|
| That is pretty rad.
| vlunkr wrote:
| The way that I stay optimistic is to think about how
| awareness of these issues is growing. As they say, knowing is
| half the battle.
|
| https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2019/11/25/u-s-public-
| vi...
|
| More people are concerned about climate change now, and the
| younger generations are more concerned than ever. Hopefully
| that leads to people in general making better choices, and
| more importantly, electing people who aren't deep in the
| pockets of the fossil fuel industry.
| SammyNameTaken wrote:
| the article mentions words with friends as if those games are
| something to be shunned. maybe the social aspect is what improves
| your mood not video games, based on this it would seem that
| tabletop games would have the same if not better results
| considering real life social interactions.
| corobo wrote:
| Why does the site want my location to read a blog post?
|
| Ew lol
| brandon272 wrote:
| Yes, kind of stops me from sharing it with people.
| erwinh wrote:
| Searched to upvote this comment. More than happy to get some
| bad karma for shaming this kind of website behavior.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Video games basically allowed me to get through college. I
| accidentally implemented spaced-repetition learning by studying
| for an hour or so, then playing a game of League of Legends, then
| trying to recall what I had just studied previously.
| VyseofArcadia wrote:
| Different take on the headline: when I was little and scared at
| the doctor, my mom would distract me from shots etc. by telling
| me about how they work and all the science behind them.
|
| I still do this at the doctor if I'm nervous about the procedure.
| Try distracting yourself by attempting to work through the
| details of what's going on. Even if you're wrong, it's a
| distraction and a good exercise, and maybe you can ask the doctor
| to clarify later.
|
| Never works at the dentist, though. I can never tell what the
| heck is going on in my mouth.
| tombert wrote:
| I'm 32 years old and I still have to do this whenever I get an
| injection. I have no idea what kind of trauma triggers this but
| I have an extreme phobia of needles, but I am a big supporter
| of vaccines. Every time I get a shot, I have to look away, and
| kind of go through the process of telling myself what the shot
| is doing and how it works.
| swasheck wrote:
| i did this with air disasters. i'd been terrified of flying for
| many years so i immersed myself in every kinds of media i could
| find on the topic. i found it oddly comforting (though i
| definitely overthink things whilst in the air at times).
| geeking out has helped me navigate some tense moments.
| 1-more wrote:
| The audio recordings of pilots and air traffic controllers
| doing their best Chuck Yeager voice during a malfunction and
| going through checklists and binders and clipboards is
| immensely reassuring to me. There's contingency plans for all
| the contingency plans. Everyone involved made their bed well
| enough to bounce a quarter off of it that morning and (where
| applicable) trimmed their mustaches to conform to some NIST
| standard. The drilling! Such drilling.
|
| The reenactment in Sully is pretty rad in that regard
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6HYMpmxdaA
| throwaway049 wrote:
| A few years ago a passenger plane had a window blow out and
| some other problems. In the radio recordings the pilot, a
| former military flying instructor, sounded completely
| unperturbed.
| mettamage wrote:
| I do this to get over my fear of flights :)
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| Objectivity is a totally different headspace. That's why
| critical thinking is so difficult. As unfamiliar and
| uncomfortable as it may be, it sure does have its advantages.
| cramjabsyn wrote:
| > Try distracting yourself by attempting to work through the
| details of what's going on.
|
| This helped a lot with flying anxiety, once I could put a
| reason to most of the sounds and movements of flying I could
| relax a lot better. An unexpected one will get my attention
| though
| SillyUsername wrote:
| Not necessarily a good thing knowing the science - just off the
| top of my head...
|
| Topics I wish I'd never known about
|
| - General anaesthesia and low dose
|
| - General anaesthesia and the idea you are actually awake but
| forget.
|
| - General anaesthesia stats and possibility of being awake
| (moreso if you're anxious about not going to sleep - it's
| happened to me with gas).
|
| - Flying and why the plane needs to dive for certain scenarios.
|
| - Flying and tolerances for wings during a storm (they're good
| but still!) or lightning strikes (Faraday cage but...).
|
| - Flying and knowing about coffin corner stall
| limitations/margin for error.
|
| - Flying and survival stats if there's actually a serious
| incident.
|
| Probably a load more...!
| LordDragonfang wrote:
| >Flying and survival stats if there's actually a serious
| incident.
|
| This is such a bad contextualization of the risks if you
| _actually_ know the stats on the matter, since there are ~600
| million passengers per year and <600 (as in, fewer than a
| thousand) fatalities; you have less that one in a million
| chance to experience a "serious" incident - in fact, I'm
| pretty sure the definition of a "serious" incident in this
| context is "an incident that normally results in a large
| number of fatalities". Which makes your stat above very
| nearly a tautology.
|
| My point is that this is very much an example of where
| internalizing the stats _should_ make you feel safer, unless
| you 're letting a cognitive bias (like anxiety) prevent you
| from actually internalizing the real risks.
| SillyUsername wrote:
| I fly because I know the stats. I worry because the stats
| for survival are low (or worse, you actually survive the
| impact). It also doesn't help that I live near a major
| airport and almost on a fortnightly basis we get reports of
| planes declaring minor emergencies and having to turn
| around or be diverted. Occasionally it may be bird
| strike/engine fire.
| ambicapter wrote:
| > Flying and knowing about coffin corner stall
| limitations/margin for error.
|
| Unless you're already one hell of a pilot you will never be
| anywhere close to coffin corner.
| VectorLock wrote:
| >General anaesthesia and the idea you are actually awake but
| forget.
|
| This freaked me out as well. Wouldn't I know in the moment?
| Do we actually experience something if we don't encode
| memories for it?
| gowld wrote:
| > Do we actually experience something if we don't encode
| memories for it?
|
| It's not "don't encode memories"; it's "lose conscious
| memory". Your body still scars from cuts when you are
| unconscious. Your brain likely does too.
| the_af wrote:
| > _General anaesthesia and the idea you are actually awake
| but forget_
|
| Do you mean that this happens for some people? For me, GA
| felt like a very deep dream where I didn't notice falling
| asleep but I definitely remember what I dreamed.
| munificent wrote:
| I think the parent poster if confusing general anesthesia
| from sedation [1]. If you got a colonoscopy or your wisdom
| teeth out, it was probably sedation. If you got major
| surgery where they cut a big hole in you, that's more
| likely to be general anesthesia.
|
| "Twilight sedation" is pretty spooky from a philosophical
| perspective. You are somewhat aware of what's happening to
| you and are experiencing it in the moment. But you are
| unable to form long term memories of it, so after the
| procedure, it's like it didn't happen. But there _was_ a
| point in time where they you that you were was at least
| somewhat conscious of the procedure.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedation
| gowld wrote:
| The other aspect of twilight sedations is: do you feel
| pain and then lose the conscious memory, but retain the
| stress reaction's affect on your body?
|
| And similarly for anesthesia: even if you don't feel
| pain, is your body having a stress reaction? Obviously
| yes to some extent, for the non-neural pathways that are
| physically insulted during the procedure, but what about
| for neural pathways?
| SillyUsername wrote:
| Quite possibly, I don't know the difference - as a kid I
| had to have serious orthodontic changes to my teeth as
| none of my baby teeth fell out and grew to the size of
| adult teeth.
|
| One of the last surgeries I had, which was breaking off 4
| molars, I felt like I was going to explode breathing the
| gas - like really painful pins and needles everywhere, my
| eyes actually opened and I felt like they were rolling
| back into my head (think pain of a really bad migraine
| but in your eyes). Fortunately they closed my eyes, and
| it stopped but I couldn't speak, next thing I know my
| mouth is being held open with a vice, very painful, but I
| couldn't see, couldn't talk (wouldn't have been able to
| anyway with the jaw vice).
|
| Aside from remembering panicking further, and occasional
| fuzzy memory of pain followed by (I guess) being
| unconscious again, that's all I remember of being awake.
| When they finished I had to be slapped hard across the
| face at the end multiple times (this was the 80s),
| probably because the anaesthesiologist had O/D'd me on
| realising I was still awake. I was later told they were
| considering taking me to hospital because I wasn't waking
| up - this was the last time I had dental surgery.
|
| About 5-6 years later they banned the gas they used on me
| in the UK.
|
| I may need some routine (real, hospital) surgery in a
| year or so, and now I can't stop thinking about last time
| I had the above, I even started googling chances of being
| awake etc etc (because it does happen) and really wish I
| hadn't.
| austinprete wrote:
| There's also the concept of anesthesia awareness [1],
| which does apply to general anesthesia.
|
| [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anesthesia_awareness
| whateverman23 wrote:
| I've helped a couple of family members who have gone
| under the sedation that you're talking about. I don't
| care how much more dangerous or more expensive general
| anesthesia is. I'm taking that option every time. I never
| ever want to be under the sedation you're talking about.
|
| That sedation takes hours and hours to wear off, where
| you're worse than helpless. Completely memory free for
| hours after the surgery is over and can barely function.
| It's terrifying.
|
| Meanwhile, when I've woken up from general anesthesia the
| few times I've been under, I'm almost immediately
| perfectly conscious and able to function on my own and
| remember things.
| throw__away7391 wrote:
| When I had my wisdom teeth out, I had a "dream" that I
| was on a old wooden mine-cart styled roller coaster with
| wheels that were sparking dramatically against the rails
| first on the left side, then on the right. (mirroring the
| teeth removal)
| kulahan wrote:
| I've heard that one of the greatest counters to fear is
| curiosity, and that people who tend to be more curious tend to
| also be less fearful. It makes sense when you think about it.
| chairmanwow1 wrote:
| I asked my dentist a lot of questions and had them give me a
| tour of the shop. I was getting a crown and they showed me
| their CNC machine that took a 3D scan of the original tooth and
| scan of the nub after eroding it down and just perfectly
| machined a ceramic replacement.
|
| Pretty fucking sick.
| ashleyn wrote:
| Sounds a lot like intellectualisation.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectualization
| VyseofArcadia wrote:
| Hm, maybe it is that for some people, but for me, another
| large component is that understanding the procedure makes it
| less scary. The doctor isn't doing these mysterious horrible
| things and you don't know what's coming next. You do know, or
| at least suspect, what's coming next, so the fear of the
| unknown/unexpected is mitigated.
| quartz wrote:
| I have a dentist who loves to use the little remote camera to
| show me everything about my teeth and let me tell you: it
| doesn't make it any better!
|
| Totally agree on the "understand to remove fear" side of things
| though.
|
| When I was learning stick shift I had a terrible time until,
| frustrated after I had stalled the car for the umpteenth time,
| my dad stopped the lesson on "what to do" and instead spent a
| few minutes explaining what was actually happening inside the
| clutch system.
|
| Suddenly it all made sense and I understood what I was
| actuating and why the feedback was the way it was. I became
| proficient quickly after that.
| teachrdan wrote:
| My father in law was a tennis coach. When a kid kept screwing
| something up, he'd stop them and ask in quick succession:
| "What's the capital of Illinois? Texas? Vermont?"
|
| The kid would then, invariably, be able to hit the ball
| again. Sometimes all you need is a focused distraction to be
| able to perform.
| pts_ wrote:
| I have dealt with the pandemic and wfh stress by immersing
| myself in science and technology.
| JohnFen wrote:
| The best dentist I ever had was as much a geek about all things
| dental as I am a geek about all things computers. He would
| happily describe, in great technical detail, every aspect of
| what he was doing, why, etc.
|
| It was pretty awesome, and I left every visit feeling very
| positive about the experience.
| olvy0 wrote:
| There was this one time I had a prolonged dental operation, I
| was fully conscious, the dentist talked himself through a
| delicate situation while hunting in my mouth for the right
| angle to do it. And I thought suddenly, hey, it's just like
| me when I'm debugging! Cool!
| JohnFen wrote:
| Yes!
|
| What your doctor (and dentist, etc.) are really doing with
| you is exactly the same as what you do when you're
| debugging a program. Except that health care providers
| don't have the luxury of having a debugger or the ability
| to examine the "machine" state in accurate detail.
| doubled112 wrote:
| For some extra perspective in the case of a dentist,
| there's also a live, breathing, feeling, conscious human
| they're about to drill into or debug on.
|
| No thanks!
| JohnFen wrote:
| Just consider brain surgery! Same thing applies, except
| worse.
| dclowd9901 wrote:
| Ha, you reminded me of when I got my vasectomy. Naturally a bit
| nervous, I was asking about everything the doctor was doing as
| he was doing it. It actually did help me get through the
| procedure with less nerves (it's really not a bad procedure at
| all, just for anyones edification).
| DontchaKnowit wrote:
| Yeah, of course, its a form of escapism escapism always relieves
| stress and anxiety and improves mood for as long as you are
| engaged in it.
| denvaar wrote:
| I've noticed when I begin to feel anxious (which for me is
| basically "health anxiety" that spirals) I get back into
| RuneScape (old school version), and it really helps get me back
| to a good place IRL.
| andrepd wrote:
| It's the opposite for me lol. It's when I'm most depressed that
| I turn to osrs
| denvaar wrote:
| Oh, I see how what I said can be taken both ways. I think
| we're on the same page actually: When I feel bad, I begin to
| play osrs, and then after a while I feel good again and
| usually stop playing. Then eventually the cycle repeats.
| imchillyb wrote:
| Stress requires release. Sometimes the release for stress is
| actually more stress but of a different type.
| chad_strategic wrote:
| I made the mistake of clicking on the headline thinking it said
| "Exercise can help reduce stress and anxiety, and improve mood."
|
| I got to stop multi tasking...
| mihaifm wrote:
| Stress response depends vastly on the game. A lot of games will
| actually increase stress levels. Take Elden Ring for example,
| that game will make you sweat at almost every encounter. But it's
| possible that this kind of exposure might make you more resilient
| to stress in the long tun.
| unixgoddess wrote:
| this. I tried playing a variety of retro console games as an
| adult; most gave me unbearable anxiety within a couple minutes,
| especially platformers, side-scrollers and racing games. With
| turn-based rpgs it came more slowly from the endless boring
| grinding.
|
| Only non-timed puzzles were chill enough to play as a
| clinically anxious person.
| Forestessential wrote:
| So can heroin, the bible and television.
| nfw2 wrote:
| Heroin can also reduce stress and anxiety and improve mood (at
| least in the short term).
|
| It's great to be exploring ways to help cancer patients cope, but
| the overall thesis of this article is hardly surprising.
| hirundo wrote:
| I think it would be useful to play a simulation of cancer
| treatment that includes realistic odds of survival. It's
| difficult to grok the idea that you have an X% chance of
| surviving for Y months by just looking at the numbers, or that Z
| treatment will affect those odds for some cost in extra misery.
| Simulating the meaning of those odds by gameplay, watching your
| avatars live and die, suffering more or less, could give you a
| better gut feeling for your prospects and adjust your decision
| making accordingly.
|
| My mom fought cancer and died slowly and badly. My dad, having
| lived through that, didn't fight it and went quickly. Some people
| have the opposite experience. It would be good to have a less
| expensive way to learn these lessons.
| sidewndr46 wrote:
| "Chemotherapy simulator" seems like a bit depressing game.
| knodi123 wrote:
| Not all games are meant to be a joyful memory. It's just an
| art form, as versatile as any other.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Train_(board_game)
| twinkletwinkle_ wrote:
| It sort of exists:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That_Dragon,_Cancer
| gowld wrote:
| So does "war simulator".
| TheHypnotist wrote:
| As a League of Legends players, it could also do the opposite.
| Lapsa wrote:
| played one today. had 1/16 yasuo around 20 min mark or
| something. total joke of a game
| bluescrn wrote:
| Never expected to see a healthcare site recommending WoW raiding!
|
| If you're not careful, a game that addictive and time-consuming
| is a rapid route to weight gain, back pain, maybe even an
| unhealthy drinking habit...
|
| (To be fair though, for those who enjoyed the game in it's early
| years, WoW Classic was really good 'comfort gaming' during the
| Covid period, but it's certainly added to lockdown weight gain)
| sandworm101 wrote:
| For many truly sick people, including some cancer patients,
| weight gain is not a bad thing. An old prof of mine, a man
| dying of pancreatic cancer, once said to me "A whole life of
| the doctor telling me to exercise more, and suddenly he is
| worried about me loosing weight too quickly."
| MrGilbert wrote:
| Same goes for just hanging out with your friends in the evening
| without any sports, eh?
| deebosong wrote:
| Just to take the comment seriously, when I kick it with
| buddies, I seem to be naturally attuned and attentive to my
| bodily needs way more than when I get sucked into a very
| addicting videogame, where after I finally snap out of the
| fugue state, a lot of my bodily needs are like, "WERE YOU NOT
| LISTENING TO US FOR THE PAST 2-3 HOURS OR SOMETHING?"
|
| It's legit made me try to find videogames that are not that
| addicting, but not that boring, and it's extremely hard to
| find lol.
| calibas wrote:
| In my experience, it depends on which game I'm playing. Some
| games reduce stress but others, like League of Legends, greatly
| increase my stress levels.
|
| There's a number of games that I either play very briefly or
| avoid entirely because I feel more anxious and stressed after
| playing them.
| neomindryan wrote:
| Studies show that patients who played the[se] games responded
| better to chemotherapy, and had a much better understanding of
| the treatment process on the whole.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I enjoyed playing chess on my phone during gaps (train commute,
| or else). It was a good blend of distraction and strategy.
| smegsicle wrote:
| or you could just smoke a cigarette like a normal person
| 9991 wrote:
| Despite the popularity, there's nothing normal about smoking
| cigarettes.
| rationalfaith wrote:
| [dead]
| mayormcmatt wrote:
| Not Tarkov, that's for sure.
| rye-neat wrote:
| I'm nearing 40 and in the past few years I've tried to focus more
| on "real world" activities (I've never lacked them, I just felt
| like gaming had less value). I've done well with this by spending
| time with my interests/pastimes; however, my work lately has been
| less stimulating. As a result, something has been missing.
|
| Long story short, I realized I wasn't getting into a "flow-state"
| often enough and guess where you can get an easy fix of that?
| First-person shooters.. (for me anyway). I don't have 3+ hour-
| long sessions or anything, maybe just a round or two and it's
| like that first cup of coffee in the morning.
| sacnoradhq wrote:
| Try writing or coding for fun.
|
| Caffeine, while increasing focus, ups anxiety and cardio load.
|
| Exercise (HIIT) I find is better at increasing focus and
| decreasing anxiety.
| xwdv wrote:
| Come hang out with us in VR Chat and engage in fiery debates
| similar to what you find on hackernews except in real time VR and
| you could actually punch someone maybe.
| Nuzzerino wrote:
| Too much anxiety there from the fact that they now require you
| to run kernel-mode spyware (EAC). Haven't logged in since.
| xwdv wrote:
| Just get a dedicated gaming rig that is only for gaming. I
| have one machine for browsing and general productivity which
| is more locked down, and another purely for games. And a
| third for all the illegal stuff.
| [deleted]
| fullshark wrote:
| Like all vices.
| boshalfoshal wrote:
| This should be voted higher. People really want video games
| (and other things like certain drugs) to be innocuous and maybe
| even "healthy" but its just like any other instant dopamine
| rush, and can - and is often designed to be - addictive to keep
| you hooked and engaged in their product.
|
| Imo a far better method than this is to exercise, walk outside,
| or play sports. These are natural dopamine boosts with little
| to no real downside.
| eigenvalue wrote:
| I think the issue here is one of timescale and trading off short-
| term versus long-term joy/fulfillment. Playing games is often fun
| in the moment, and can certainly have a positive social component
| and can be challenging and build skills and in general be a way
| to blow off steam and decompress after a long day of work,
| similar to how many people watch TV.
|
| But I have basically stopped playing games totally for the past
| decade, and I am so glad to have gotten all that time back to do
| other things which build up over time and then ultimately provide
| me with a lot more happiness, like learning new skills, reading
| scientific papers on ML/AI, learning how to use tools like
| Blender, reading biographies/history, etc. There is only so much
| time in a day, and when I look back on how many hours I spent
| during my mental prime playing stuff like Starcraft and Quake, I
| really wish I could have that time back and instead done other
| things.
|
| Obviously this is just my take on it, and I'm not trying to shame
| anyone about playing games or saying they are bad. But I think
| it's wrong to focus on the upsides without at least being aware
| of what you might be trading off for that short term dopamine hit
| and fun.
| e_i_pi_2 wrote:
| I think this is mostly based on different needs at different
| times - most people play more games when they're younger and
| have more uncertainty in their life. As you get older there's
| less uncertainty and less need for things with semi-predictable
| outcomes. Doesn't mean you underestimated the benefit at the
| time - just that it's not as useful to you in this stage of
| your life
|
| There's periods where I want to learn a bunch of new
| technologies, and other times when I can't. It's all time well
| spent just in different areas
| otikik wrote:
| Perhaps that time spent playing Starcraft in the past was part
| of what enabled you to do other things now. Transition from
| mid-game to late-game.
| web3-is-a-scam wrote:
| After 2 years of lockdowns, playing Elden Ring basically saved my
| life. I had heard heard this a lot about the Souls series of
| games from other people, how the hardships and overcoming them in
| the game taught people how to overcome IRL hardshipand build
| character; never thought it would have happened to me though, I
| thought I had a pretty solid grasp of "adulting" and "real life"
| but being in lockdown nearly broke me.
| Ancalagon wrote:
| Caveat being Super Smash Bros Ultimate - Online:
|
| This greatly increases stress and anxiety.
| havblue wrote:
| I think one of the things that has kept me from games over the
| past 6 months is the progression systems that are tricking me
| into wanting to play more. I mean, everything in moderation, and
| I'd like to finish Elden Ring, but family time, chores and work
| don't exactly leave much for hobbies like this that require all
| of your attention. (Audio books and podcasts in comparison allow
| for partial attention)
|
| I guess I'm wondering more how high up some of these games can be
| on my bucket list when my time is already booked out.
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