Yale Univ. Study finds Video/Computer Games Not so Bad for Teens

Objective 
Video game playing may negatively impact youth. However, the existing literature on gaming is inconsistent and often has focused on aggression rather than the health correlates of gaming and the prevalence and correlates of problematic gaming.


Methods  
We anonymously surveyed 4028 adolescents about gaming and reported problems with gaming and other health behaviors.  

• A total of 51.2% of the sample reported gaming (76.3% of boys and 29.2% of girls).

Results 
There were no negative health correlates of gaming in boys and lower odds of smoking regularly; however, girls who reported gaming were less likely to report depression and more likely to report getting into serious fights and carrying a weapon to school.

• Among gamers, 4.9% reported problematic gaming, defined as reporting trying to cut back, experiencing an irresistible urge to play, and experiencing a growing tension that could only be relieved by playing. 
• Boys were more likely to report these problems (5.8%) than girls (3.0%). Correlates of problematic gaming included regular cigarette smoking, drug use, depression, and serious fights. Results suggest that gaming is largely normative in boys and not associated with many health factors. In girls, however, gaming seems to be associated with more externalizing behaviors and fewer internalizing symptoms.

Conclusions  
The prevalence of problematic gaming is low but not insignificant, and problematic gaming may be contained within a larger spectrum of externalizing behaviors. More research is needed to define safe levels of gaming, refine the definition of problematic gaming, and evaluate effective prevention and intervention strategies.

Reference:
 LA Times http:// latimes.com
[Check out the full study, published Tuesday in the journal Pediatrics.]

The "Ames" Optical Illusion

 Ames room is a distorted room that is used to create an optical illusion. Probably influenced by the writings of Hermann Helmholtz, it was invented by American ophthalmologist Adelbert Ames, Jr. in 1934, and constructed in the following year.

An Ames room is constructed so that from the front it appears to be an ordinary cubic-shaped room, with a back wall and two side walls parallel to each other and perpendicular to the horizontally level floor and ceiling. 

• However, this is a trick of perspective and the true shape of the room is trapezoidal: 

the walls are slanted and the ceiling and floor are at an incline, and the right corner is much closer to the front-positioned observer than the left corner (or vice versa).

As a result of the optical illusion, a person standing in one corner appears to the observer to be a giant, while a person standing in the other corner appears to be a dwarf. The illusion is convincing enough that a person walking back and forth from the left corner to the right corner appears to grow or shrink.
Studies have shown that the illusion can be created without using walls and a ceiling; it is sufficient to create an apparent horizon (which in reality will not be horizontal) against an appropriate background, and the eye relies on the apparent relative height of an object above that horizon.