Tom Chatfield: 7 ways video games engage the brain

[clapping]

I love video games, I'm also slightly

in awe of them.

I am in awe of their power in terms of

imagination in terms of technology

in terms of concept

but I think above all I am in awe of their

power to motivate, to compel us, to

transfix us, like really nothing else we ever

have at this point, done before.

And I think that we can learn some pretty

amazing things by looking at how they do

this. And in a particular thing, we can

learn things about learning. Now, the

videogames industry is far and away the

fastest growing of modern media from about

10 billion in 1990 worth to 50 billion

globally today, shows no sign of slowing

down. In four years time, it is estimated

to be over 80 billion dollars. That's

about three times the recording music

industry. This is pretty stunning but I

don't think it's the most telling

statistic of all. The thing that really

amazes me is that today, people spend

about 8 billion real dollars a year on

virtual items that only exist inside video

games. This is screenshot of a virtual

game world in Entropia Universe. Earlier

this year a virtual astroid sold for 350

thousand real dollars. And this is a

Titan Colossal ship in the space game Eve

Online and this virtual object takes 200

real people about 56 days of real time to

build plus countless thousands of hours of

effort before that, and yet many of these

get built. At the other end of the

scale. The game Farm Ville you may well

of heard of has 70 million players around

the world. Most of these players are playing

it almost everyday. This may sound quite

alarming to some people

An index of something worrying or wrong

in society. But we're here for the good news

and the good news is that I think we can

explore why this very real human effort,

this very intense generation of value is

occuring and by answering that question,

I think we can take something extremely

powerful. I think the most interesting way

to think about what is going on is in

terms of rewards. Specifically, in terms

of the very intense emotional rewards

that playing games offers to people,

both individually and collectively.

Now, if we look at what's going on in

someone's head when they are being

engaged, two quite different processes

are occuring. One the one hand there's the

wanting process, a bit like ambition

and drive.