WEBVTT - Tetris vs. PTSD 0:00:01.560 --> 0:00:04.760 Welcome to Stuff from the Science Lab from how stuff 0:00:04.760 --> 0:00:16.200 works dot com. Hey guys, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:18.800 This is Alice Madamok, the science editor at how stuff 0:00:18.800 --> 0:00:21.279 works dot com. This is Robert Lamb, science writer at 0:00:21.280 --> 0:00:24.000 how stuff works dot com. Today we're talking about post 0:00:24.079 --> 0:00:27.520 traumatic stress disorder and Tetris. Yeah, this is one of 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:30.000 the maybe the only video game that me and you 0:00:30.040 --> 0:00:32.880 can actually uh bond over. Yeah. I'm not much of 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:36.120 a gamer, but you are. Well, I'm not as certainly 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:37.360 not as much as a lot of people I know, 0:00:37.440 --> 0:00:40.199 but I I enjoy playing uh, you know, stuff like 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:43.040 Fallout three, things of that nature. You know, Generally, I'm 0:00:43.040 --> 0:00:44.920 more like I'll play a few games a year and 0:00:44.960 --> 0:00:47.319 getting really get into maybe one or two games a year. 0:00:47.680 --> 0:00:49.800 So you have played oh yeah yeah, back in uh 0:00:49.840 --> 0:00:51.519 I guess JR. I think, Yeah, I headed on like 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:55.280 the original in ne e s um and like my 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:57.400 whole family would play it and then we would just 0:00:57.480 --> 0:01:00.440 walk around the house just seeing blocks move around in 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:03.680 our head dream and at night um and then I 0:01:03.720 --> 0:01:04.880 had it for I think I had it for PS 0:01:04.920 --> 0:01:07.720 two as well, but I never got into didn't really 0:01:07.720 --> 0:01:09.560 get into it as much for that because you know 0:01:10.080 --> 0:01:12.200 it's not a I mean, it's an awesome game, but 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:14.040 there's only so much you can do to it to 0:01:14.160 --> 0:01:17.880 revamp it, you know, your blocks falling down, reorganizing. I 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.039 went to neat Little Rose. Now there was a really 0:01:20.080 --> 0:01:23.200 cool money Python version of it um that came out 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:26.080 for PC, where you know, it's like to bring out 0:01:26.080 --> 0:01:29.160 your dad. So each block was a like a dead 0:01:29.200 --> 0:01:32.360 medieval peasant bent into a certain shape and they would 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:35.360 fall down into this big mass grave and you would 0:01:35.440 --> 0:01:38.000 move them around and then maybe squishy noises when they 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:40.920 lock into place. That was pretty awesome. I played a 0:01:40.920 --> 0:01:43.120 ton of Touchris my senior year of college when my 0:01:43.440 --> 0:01:46.600 thesis was do Yeah. I just remember thinking about the 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:48.160 thesis and then thinking, well, I think I'm just going 0:01:48.240 --> 0:01:51.440 to play a little Tetris instead on Caroline, my roommates computer, 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:53.360 and I played a lot of chats, so much so 0:01:53.480 --> 0:01:55.800 that I actually jumped about it. Wow, were you afraid 0:01:55.800 --> 0:01:57.360 that you would turn in your paper and you look, 0:01:57.360 --> 0:01:58.360 got that done, and you get it back and be 0:01:58.360 --> 0:01:59.720 an f and you look at it. All you did 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:05.680 was just draw Tetris blocks for like thirty pages. Yeah, Yeah, 0:02:05.240 --> 0:02:08.400 I wasn't thinking too much about my academics data at 0:02:08.400 --> 0:02:10.840 that point in my life, although I should have been so. 0:02:11.000 --> 0:02:13.000 Tetris has a use outside of the gaming world and 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:17.080 keeping us occupied. Um. A bunch of Oxford researchers have 0:02:17.240 --> 0:02:20.920 postulated that Tetris might be useful for treating post traumatic 0:02:20.960 --> 0:02:25.480 stress disorder. Yeah, this is pretty exciting. UM. Post traumatic 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:28.520 stress disorder, for those of you who don't know, is 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:32.519 a disorder that arises in the wake of a traumatic experience. 0:02:32.919 --> 0:02:36.640 This could be um, you know, a combat situation in 0:02:36.680 --> 0:02:40.560 a war. It could be UM experiencing some sort of violence. 0:02:40.639 --> 0:02:42.839 It could be being in a car wreck. It could 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:47.240 be even like just being being diagnosed with a really 0:02:47.280 --> 0:02:51.239 severe illness, the life threatening illness. Yeah, and children can 0:02:51.320 --> 0:02:55.360 experience PTSD as well. And you can also get it 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:57.320 from just seeing like if you just see it a 0:02:57.360 --> 0:03:01.040 traumatic car accident, you know, or or think about something 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:03.560 like not eleven you I mean, you didn't you saw it, right, 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:05.400 and a lot of or maybe you were acting in 0:03:05.520 --> 0:03:07.960 a rescue capacity to post not eleven. But even if 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:09.920 you just saw it, you know on the TV. I 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:11.440 mean you're just you know, heard about it, you can 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:15.040 still you know, develop the same disorder. And if you 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:18.920 develop PTSD, your response to the event. Um. According to 0:03:18.960 --> 0:03:21.040 the Mental Health Bible, the d S M four is 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:24.480 going to involve some sort of intense sphere or helplessness 0:03:24.560 --> 0:03:27.960 or horror. And in children this tends to manifest itself 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:33.800 and disorganized or agitated behavior. And the characteristic symptoms of 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:37.480 PTSD are are probably ones which with which are familiar. Um. 0:03:37.520 --> 0:03:40.880 The hallmark one being flashbacks. Right, yeah, this is the 0:03:41.400 --> 0:03:43.600 you know we've seen everybody's seen this in a movie 0:03:43.720 --> 0:03:46.080 or something. You know, you'll have like the great the 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:48.280 classic example as you have like a Vietnam bed, or 0:03:48.320 --> 0:03:51.600 maybe he's in a racky or that, you know, Afghanistan 0:03:52.640 --> 0:03:55.200 that and uh, you know it comes back home. He's 0:03:55.240 --> 0:03:57.320 in like just a normal grocery store ride. He's going 0:03:57.360 --> 0:03:59.760 around his business. He's he's picking out the groceries, and 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:01.760 then but he drops a can of soup. Here's a 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:04.800 loud noise, and then he's he's suddenly he's back in 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:07.040 the war again. You know, he's he's falling to the 0:04:07.080 --> 0:04:09.240 ground and thinks, you know, thinks he has to grab 0:04:09.360 --> 0:04:11.640 his gun. In that kind of a situation, a flashback 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:14.360 is a seriously intense experience. I mean, you're there, you're 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:17.120 reliving the moment. It's not just like, oh, hey, man, 0:04:17.160 --> 0:04:18.760 I had a flashback when I saw that guy I 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:20.760 told her Monday in the nineteen eighties. I mean a 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.920 flashback in this sense, in the psychological sense, it is 0:04:24.120 --> 0:04:28.640 a dissociative state. You're you're not present, it's fully sensory, 0:04:28.800 --> 0:04:33.480 it's you're gone. Yeah. So if you have these symptoms, 0:04:33.480 --> 0:04:35.120 they have to be present for more than a month 0:04:35.320 --> 0:04:38.680 for you in order for you to be diagnosed with PTSD. Yeah, 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:40.359 it's it's not the same if you say, like, you 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:42.360 see a pretty shocking horror movie and you're like in 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:44.320 you know, for a week, you're like, man, that was 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:46.000 you know, to keep the scene keeps running over in 0:04:46.000 --> 0:04:48.719 your mind because I've had that happened before. Yeah, me too. 0:04:49.000 --> 0:04:51.320 But thankfully it goes away and you forget that you 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:53.760 ever saw that movie. Yeah, the CDC actually calls that 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:56.560 would probably call that a stress reaction. Um, And it's 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:59.520 just something immediately following a traumatic event. But this will 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:02.960 go We'll go away within ten days, um. Whereas you 0:05:03.040 --> 0:05:06.720 just watch Total Recall again and it happens all over right. 0:05:06.720 --> 0:05:09.160 So PTSD tends to stick around longer for that, and 0:05:09.279 --> 0:05:12.000 it impairs your life. It impairs your ability to your job, 0:05:12.080 --> 0:05:14.360 your ability to interact with family and friends. And of 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:16.599 course this has been in the news a lot less 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:19.880 several years because we've uh in the States, we've been 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:21.720 a kind of at war for the last several years, 0:05:21.760 --> 0:05:25.880 so we have a lot of troops going overseas, encountering violent, 0:05:25.920 --> 0:05:28.560 traumatic situations and then coming back home and trying to 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:31.960 readjust mental health is becoming more and more of a priority, 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:35.680 so we're trying to tackle these problems and treat them clinically. So, 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:38.200 according to the Associated Press, there's a fifty million dollar 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:40.280 five year study that the Army is conducting, and the 0:05:40.880 --> 0:05:43.359 Army is doing this in concert with the National Institute 0:05:43.400 --> 0:05:46.880 of Mental Health, and the idea is to give commanders 0:05:46.880 --> 0:05:49.360 in the army a better idea of the troops mental health. 0:05:50.160 --> 0:05:54.000 And then there's the other fact that you know, suicide 0:05:54.080 --> 0:05:57.200 or you know, returning that who who winds up killing 0:05:57.279 --> 0:06:00.159 himself or killing somebody else is gonna draw attentions, to 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:01.840 draw our attention to the problem, is going to grab 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:03.880 media headlines. Yeah, it's not the kind of thing you 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:06.640 want in a recruitment brochure, you know, join the army 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:09.680 be screwed up for life. So you should emphasize that 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:13.599 prevalence rates of PTSD among returning service members, you know, 0:06:13.680 --> 0:06:16.640 really around the gamut um. I saw one fact sheet 0:06:16.680 --> 0:06:20.400 that estimated, you know, that saw prevalence rates of as 0:06:20.440 --> 0:06:22.839 low as one percent among returning service members and as 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:26.159 high as six And there's also the problem of PTSD 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:28.360 kind of being a big tent to you know, to 0:06:28.480 --> 0:06:32.000 fall under, to diagnose, doesn't manifest itself the same way 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:36.200 with every patient, greg right, And there's you know, there's 0:06:36.200 --> 0:06:39.120 such a number of reactions that can cause somebody to 0:06:39.120 --> 0:06:42.080 develop PTSD, So it's it's just a very sort of 0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:45.760 wide disorder at this point. The good news is that 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:48.800 we actually have some some good treatments for full blown PTSD. 0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:51.560 One thing to keep in mind with post traumatic stress 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:54.719 disorder is that it's kind of like getting a stain 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:57.440 on a garment, all right, Like you're say, you're at 0:06:57.440 --> 0:07:00.560 a party, right and you're drinking great do like we 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:03.040 all drink at parties, and you spill it on like 0:07:03.080 --> 0:07:05.880 your white blouse or whatever. Are you wearing a white 0:07:05.880 --> 0:07:08.120 blouse a party? Yeah? I frequently got a grape juice 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:11.880 drinking parties, and I foolishly always wear my best white blouse. 0:07:12.160 --> 0:07:15.360 But but yeah, so like you, you spill grape juice 0:07:15.360 --> 0:07:18.440 on this this garment, right. Um. Most of our treatment 0:07:18.440 --> 0:07:21.560 methods that we have are aimed at like the next day, 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:24.160 we're like, oh, I got grape juice on my blouse. 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:26.240 It's that staining really seeped in. What can I do 0:07:26.280 --> 0:07:29.360 to try and get it out? As opposed to Oops, 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:31.760 I just felt grape juice on my my blouse. Who 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:33.280 has some soda water? Who has something? What can I 0:07:33.280 --> 0:07:36.320 do to sub this up before it spreads? Right? So, 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:40.000 to continue Robert's sort of autoology, that's what I'm here for. 0:07:40.320 --> 0:07:43.640 To let's talk about the scenario in which the grape 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:46.080 juice has already you know, stained your shirt and you're 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:48.520 you know, it's full blown. This is when we're looking 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:52.080 to treat full blown PTSD. Uh. Yeah. One method we have, 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:55.880 and this is the most the most validated, is a 0:07:56.120 --> 0:08:00.360 cognitive behavioral therapy with some sort of exposure con opponent. 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:03.840 And this can fall under under This can fall under 0:08:03.840 --> 0:08:09.200 two categories, either like real life exposure or imaginary um 0:08:09.760 --> 0:08:13.360 like say you get like one example of real Well, yeah, 0:08:13.400 --> 0:08:16.400 one example of like a real life situation would be, uh, 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:19.040 there's a recent episode of This American Life. But a 0:08:19.040 --> 0:08:21.920 guy who came back from uh from Iraq. Uh, he's 0:08:21.960 --> 0:08:25.560 of that he's going to college, right, Yeah, he's us 0:08:25.680 --> 0:08:28.760 that going to college. And he had just become he 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:31.520 had just had this post traumatic stress reaction to being 0:08:31.520 --> 0:08:33.559 around anybody who looked like they might be in a 0:08:33.640 --> 0:08:36.520 rocky um. And of course he's at a college, so 0:08:36.559 --> 0:08:38.560 there are there are a number of students that are 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:41.120 either you know, of a Rocky descent or Middle Eastern descent. 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:43.360 And he would see these these people and he would 0:08:43.360 --> 0:08:45.600 just start freaking out a little, you know, he starts 0:08:45.600 --> 0:08:49.000 shivering and thinking about ways to like eliminate them. Um, 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:51.560 he chose, and I think it should be stressing. This 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:54.640 was against the advice of his u of the of 0:08:54.400 --> 0:08:56.960 the the guy treating him at the time was that 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.839 he was going to join the college's Muslim students. So 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.320 the issue. Yeah, so that's very much a real life 0:09:03.880 --> 0:09:07.320 um exposure, you know, and and a very drastic one. 0:09:07.559 --> 0:09:11.600 And the unconventional yes, and unconventional and it based on 0:09:11.920 --> 0:09:14.719 the story, Um, it turned out rather well for him 0:09:14.720 --> 0:09:17.679 he was able to really grow from that. UM. An 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:21.079 example of a of an imaginary one would be if 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:23.839 your therapist like brings you through like a thought exercise, 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:28.439 you know, like talks you through and imagined scenario or UM, 0:09:28.520 --> 0:09:30.120 you were to engage in some sort of like a 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:34.040 virtual reality treatment where UH, you know, you say you're 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:37.439 you're you have post traumatic stress from a combat situation, 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:40.440 if you played a video game that was tailored to 0:09:40.800 --> 0:09:46.320 UH to simulate that that same situation over again. So 0:09:46.440 --> 0:09:48.120 this is this is a pretty good way to treat 0:09:48.160 --> 0:09:50.560 PTSD for for people out there affected by And then 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:53.160 there's another one, and this one may sound a little fringy, 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:56.240 but it's also a gained pretty widespread acceptance and it's 0:09:56.280 --> 0:09:58.839 called e M d R and the E M d 0:09:59.040 --> 0:10:05.200 R stands for movement Desensitization reprocessing UM. The originator was 0:10:05.240 --> 0:10:08.079 somebody by the name of Francine Shapira back in So 0:10:08.120 --> 0:10:12.840 this is a relatively new therapy and it's similar to 0:10:13.120 --> 0:10:16.080 the cognitive behavioral therapy and that you might find yourself 0:10:16.120 --> 0:10:19.959 talking through your traumatic event, but the differences while you're 0:10:20.000 --> 0:10:23.120 talking through this traumatic event with a therapist who's qualified 0:10:23.120 --> 0:10:25.520 in this particular kind of treatment e M d R. 0:10:27.000 --> 0:10:30.160 Your eye is going to be moving bilaterally, it's gonna 0:10:30.160 --> 0:10:32.959 be tracking this light, or you may find yourself hearing 0:10:32.960 --> 0:10:36.679 audio tones or in fact feeling something like a kind 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:39.679 of tapping sensation on your palm. So you're feeling all 0:10:39.760 --> 0:10:42.959 these external stimuli in addition to you know, talking about 0:10:43.000 --> 0:10:46.520 the traumatic event with your therapist. And the idea behind 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:48.959 this kind of therapy is that E M d R 0:10:49.040 --> 0:10:52.240 stimulates the brain's hemispheres and it helps your nervous system 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:56.040 reorganize those memories. Um, you're probably not going to just 0:10:56.080 --> 0:10:58.320 do it in one session though, it's more more of 0:10:58.320 --> 0:11:00.920 a process. Like I'm going to go in for M 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:04.000 d R session today. It's really interesting to watch. I 0:11:04.040 --> 0:11:06.120 would think it would be distracting it It actually sounds 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:08.079 a little bit like a video game. It does. Yeah, 0:11:08.200 --> 0:11:11.439 watching lights moved back and forth, something sort of vibrating 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:15.360 in your hands. Maybe, I mean that's yeah. So, like 0:11:15.480 --> 0:11:17.840 Robert was saying, these are treatments that we'd use on 0:11:17.880 --> 0:11:21.520 somebody who's already experiencing the symptoms of full blown PTSD, 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:25.440 but there are early interventions are sort of quick ways 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:30.120 to prevent um PTSD from developing or at least reduced 0:11:30.160 --> 0:11:32.120 the incidence of flashbacks. Yeah, these are the this is 0:11:32.160 --> 0:11:34.640 the sopping of the grape juice before it spreads. Messing 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:40.080 method um and one of those is to use morphineum, 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:44.320 which has been used in combat with combat casualties. Uh 0:11:44.760 --> 0:11:47.680 you know some situations where uh, you know, you're having 0:11:47.679 --> 0:11:52.040 to to treat some some injury as well. Yeah, there's 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:53.920 a big study on it just recently in two thousand 0:11:53.960 --> 0:11:56.920 ten in the New England Journal of Medicine. And basically 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:58.800 you had a bunch of guys from the Navy reporting 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:02.000 that prompt treatment with morphine cut in half the chances 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:06.640 that troops would developed symptoms of PTSD later on. Of course, 0:12:06.640 --> 0:12:10.680 it also cuts into your ability to remember what exactly 0:12:10.679 --> 0:12:13.640 happened in some cases, which can be detrimental if you say, 0:12:13.760 --> 0:12:17.280 need to testify in court about what happened. So that's 0:12:17.320 --> 0:12:19.120 that's one big down. So and the other, of course 0:12:19.160 --> 0:12:23.439 being that they're giving you morphine. So you know, there 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:25.760 are plenty of tales of people coming back from you know, 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:28.480 from from from the war and they're hooked on morphine. 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:31.800 You know, there's a whole song u Samstone by I 0:12:31.800 --> 0:12:35.160 think John Prime sing it there's a hole in Daddy's 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:38.320 arm where all the money goes, et cetera. It's like 0:12:38.320 --> 0:12:39.920 it really sad. It's about a guy who comes back 0:12:39.920 --> 0:12:42.280 a little kid. It's like a song, I mean, not 0:12:42.320 --> 0:12:45.319 a nice song, but it's really it's a good song, 0:12:45.360 --> 0:12:47.160 but it's like the saddest song ever because it's about 0:12:47.160 --> 0:12:48.839 the guy who comes back from the war hooked on 0:12:48.960 --> 0:12:52.600 morphine and just slowly just kind of goes crazy and 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:55.400 his kid and the kid has to watch him lose 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:58.920 his mind. But you have a good voice. Well yeah, 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:00.920 well anyway, it's a that song. Look it up. I'm 0:13:00.920 --> 0:13:03.880 sure it's on like YouTube or something. So that's kind 0:13:03.920 --> 0:13:07.119 of the morphine route and the downfalls being right impaired 0:13:07.480 --> 0:13:10.360 memory stuff like that. You know what about this tetris 0:13:10.400 --> 0:13:12.920 we've been talking, there's not a song about like people 0:13:12.920 --> 0:13:15.080 coming back from the war hooked on tetris. So you 0:13:15.120 --> 0:13:17.880 know this is there's some possibility here, but how does 0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:20.160 it work? Right? So this comes to us courtesy of 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:22.520 a study published in January two thousand nine in a 0:13:22.720 --> 0:13:25.480 p L O S one the Journal. So what the 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:29.160 University of Oxford researchers did was they recruited forty participants, 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:32.760 and they split them into two groups of twenty, and 0:13:32.840 --> 0:13:35.800 all of the participants watched this twelve minute pretty violent 0:13:35.800 --> 0:13:39.000 film pass of death kind of deal, right, right, pretty 0:13:39.000 --> 0:13:42.959 disturbing scenes of injury and death. And then everyone, all 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:46.600 forty participants sat idle for this thirty minute structured break. 0:13:46.880 --> 0:13:49.000 You know, maybe they filled out some paperwork, um, and 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:51.120 they were actually shown short clips of the film just 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:53.440 to reinforce what they'd seen, just to drive it home. 0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:57.760 It's terrible. I can't imagine participating an experiment like that. 0:13:57.840 --> 0:14:00.320 I remember all sorts of bad stuff if that is 0:14:00.360 --> 0:14:02.880 seen in movies for a long, long, long, long time. 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:05.360 So I don't think this would be the experiment for me. 0:14:06.360 --> 0:14:08.959 So after this thirty minutes was up, um, twenty of 0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:10.880 the people sat idle. You know, they just kind of 0:14:10.880 --> 0:14:14.720 sat there and ponder that really terrible movie or whatever 0:14:14.720 --> 0:14:17.319 they pondered. But I'm imagining they probably pondered this movie, 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:21.560 and the other twenty played Tetris for ten minutes. Which 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:23.200 group I would want to be a part of? I 0:14:23.280 --> 0:14:25.360 absolutely know which group I would want to be part 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:29.120 of Tetris? So why did they suggest Tetris? What's the 0:14:29.160 --> 0:14:31.680 deal behind playing Tetris after you see something traumatic, why 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:34.480 would they possibly do that? Well, it comes back to 0:14:34.680 --> 0:14:36.840 the It comes back to what we were talking about 0:14:36.880 --> 0:14:39.240 earlier about how you play a bunch of Tetris and 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:41.960 you start seeing the see the blocks when you're walking around, 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:46.000 or you used dream the blocks falling through space. And 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:50.280 that's because Tetris has been demonstrated to be a visio 0:14:50.480 --> 0:14:54.200 videospatial task. It draws on mental rotation and the type 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:57.960 of processing we recruit when forming mental images. That's key 0:14:58.000 --> 0:15:00.920 because there are two ways that we form memories. Okay, 0:15:00.960 --> 0:15:04.960 There's the sensory perceptual processing of the trauma, all right, 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:08.480 These are the sights and sounds, experience steering, you know, 0:15:08.680 --> 0:15:12.360 um in this violent encounter, this car wreck, etcetera. Okay, 0:15:12.480 --> 0:15:16.880 and then there's the verbal or conceptual processing where you 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:19.000 make sense of it, you turn it into a story, 0:15:19.120 --> 0:15:22.720 my story. So it's not just like trash black and blam. 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:24.920 It's like, oh my god, I was in a car wreck. 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:27.880 I could have died. That guy totally wasn't thinking about 0:15:27.920 --> 0:15:29.880 what he was doing, and like that's where you form 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:33.160 that story, all right, and this is happening immediately after 0:15:33.200 --> 0:15:37.040 the traumatic event. Right, But what if something we're competing 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:39.680 for that memory making function. What if you were saying 0:15:39.720 --> 0:15:43.520 playing techs, which is also competing for those visual spatial resources, 0:15:43.800 --> 0:15:45.800 and your brain can only execute on so many things 0:15:45.840 --> 0:15:48.520 at once. All Right, here's an experiment for everybody. If 0:15:48.520 --> 0:15:51.600 you want to test this tonight, when that special somebody 0:15:51.600 --> 0:15:54.160 in your life is is telling you about their day, 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:59.120 try playing tetris at the same time and see what happens. Um, 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:01.280 you're gonna proba. We find that it's really hard to 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:05.120 pay attention and or remember what they're telling you. Yeah, 0:16:05.160 --> 0:16:07.000 So that's it on a basic level, is that your 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:10.000 your brain has a limited capacity to make memories of 0:16:10.040 --> 0:16:13.520 this traumatic event um and or play tetris. And if 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:15.840 you're actively playing tetris, chances are it's going to devote 0:16:15.800 --> 0:16:18.960 its resources to Tetris. And this is what the researchers 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:23.239 hypothesized and in fact was proven true among the forty participants. 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:27.440 So what the researchers found was that um, after watching 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:31.600 this film, they tracked the participants for a week and 0:16:31.720 --> 0:16:33.880 in the group that played tetris UM there was a 0:16:33.880 --> 0:16:37.480 reduced incidence of flashbacks, while in the group that sat quietly, 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:40.560 you know, pondering that horrible film. They had a higher 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:44.920 number of flashbacks that they experienced. Wow, so it sounds 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:47.400 like this could really be a tool in the future 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:51.200 for immediately treating people who are in a traumatic situation. 0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:55.479 Ambulance arrives on the scene, guys a little freaked out, 0:16:55.600 --> 0:16:58.640 get him a game boy Tetris. Well, it's interesting you 0:16:58.680 --> 0:17:01.280 say that because the thirty minute time period. You probably wonder, like, 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:03.480 why did they choose thirty minutes for you know, to 0:17:03.520 --> 0:17:06.359 play Tutris, Because the researchers figured out that the average 0:17:06.359 --> 0:17:09.040 time spent waiting an emergency room is in fact thirty minutes. 0:17:09.160 --> 0:17:11.280 Really okay, so if they could get in there before, 0:17:11.520 --> 0:17:13.800 you know, the emergency room folks, could you get to 0:17:13.840 --> 0:17:16.200 the problem right? Or free touches for everybody in the 0:17:16.240 --> 0:17:18.320 emergency room? Yeah, I mean I love Touchris. I used 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:20.600 to have it on my phone. Yeah, I'm thinking about 0:17:20.640 --> 0:17:22.679 downloading it for for my phone. If I have a 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:24.600 really bad day now, I might play a game of Tetris. 0:17:25.359 --> 0:17:28.600 So that's PTSD and Tetris, But what about other video games? 0:17:28.600 --> 0:17:32.560 All right, you've read that article about you know, smokers 0:17:32.600 --> 0:17:35.320 and oh yeah, yeah, I wrote an article for Discovery 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:37.479 News a few months back, and it was about an 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:42.520 interesting study out of Canada, um where um, you know, 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:44.840 like we're saying earlier, one way to to get over 0:17:44.880 --> 0:17:49.360 your your stress situation, um um from a combat environment 0:17:49.400 --> 0:17:50.840 is to put you in a video game to put 0:17:50.880 --> 0:17:53.720 you in a combat situation. Well, these guys basically took 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:55.840 the same type of video game, like a first person shooter, 0:17:56.160 --> 0:17:58.080 except instead of a gun, you have a little hand. 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:02.239 Instead of enemies, you have floating cigarettes. And so they 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:05.719 had a whole bunch of fairly heavy smokers. Uh. And 0:18:05.720 --> 0:18:07.280 they did the same deal where they had one group 0:18:07.320 --> 0:18:09.880 there was control, one group that was the experimental, and 0:18:10.080 --> 0:18:11.760 they all came in and they did a bunch of like, 0:18:11.840 --> 0:18:14.240 let's talk about our addiction kind of thing, and you know, 0:18:14.359 --> 0:18:17.040 we're gonna rally together to beat our addictions. And then 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:19.520 one group when and did one thing and I think 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:21.520 played some sort of a game that was unrelated, and 0:18:21.520 --> 0:18:24.800 then the other group Monopoly, and then they ended up 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:26.600 killing each other because it's Monopoly and it's a horrible 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:29.000 frustrating game. But now and then the other group and 0:18:29.040 --> 0:18:31.439 they weren't smoking, so they're even more irritable but now. 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:33.760 But then the other the other group, the experimental group, 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:36.600 they would play this game where the hand crushes the cigarettes, 0:18:37.119 --> 0:18:40.119 and they found that the people who the group, that 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:43.880 the group that crushed the cigarettes had more long term 0:18:44.119 --> 0:18:47.439 success overcoming and our addiction than the other group. But 0:18:47.480 --> 0:18:49.680 the interesting part is that some of the people who 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:53.760 played the video game UM, they actually visualized themselves collecting 0:18:53.880 --> 0:18:57.240 or recording the cigarettes and didn't work on those guys. Yeah, 0:18:57.280 --> 0:18:59.720 they were just trying to you know, get more smokes. Yeah, 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:02.919 so that was a fascinating study as well. Yeah, so 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:05.400 we ask around some of our co workers about their 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:09.160 experiences with games UM having a therapeutic effect on them, 0:19:09.160 --> 0:19:12.280 and we actually found several people. The main game people 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:16.720 mentioned was Tetris. So if you have any suggestions, comments, questions, 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:19.320 just shoot us an email at science stuff at how 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:29.320 stuff works dot com for more on this and thousands 0:19:29.359 --> 0:19:32.320 of other topics. Is that how stuff works dot com. 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:35.359 Want more how stuff works, check out our blogs on 0:19:35.440 --> 0:19:37.160 the house stuff works dot com home page.