{"id":1563,"date":"2014-03-01T17:49:48","date_gmt":"2014-03-01T06:49:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/?p=1563"},"modified":"2014-03-01T17:49:48","modified_gmt":"2014-03-01T06:49:48","slug":"too-cool-tetris-is-good-for-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/?p=1563","title":{"rendered":"Too cool&#8230; Tetris is good for you???"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>Of the 119 people that participated, 80 reported craving something: 58 people wanted food or drink of some kind, 10 wanted caffeine, and 12 wanted nicotine.<\/li>\n<li>Their mean craving levels were \u201creasonably high,\u201d the researchers write. Playing Tetris reduced their cravings by about 24 percent.<\/li>\n<li>The relationship between playing the game and craving reduction remained statistically significant, even when the researchers accounted for a general lessening of the craving over time, or removed the people who were only slightly craving something.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Potential confounder: doing nothing for three minutes could have resulted in an increase in cravings!????<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"line-height: 1.5;\">http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/health\/archive\/2014\/02\/playing-tetris-can-reduce-urges-to-eat-smoke-drink\/284056\/<\/span><\/p>\n<h1>Playing Tetris Can Reduce Urges to Eat, Smoke, Drink<\/h1>\n<div>Three minutes of the game reduced cravings by 24 percent in a recent study.<\/div>\n<div><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/julie-beck\/\" rel=\"author\">JULIE BECK<\/a><time datetime=\"2014-02-25T12:00:00-05:00\">FEB 25 2014, 12:00 PM ET<\/time><\/div>\n<div><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"line-height: 1.5;\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/cdn.theatlantic.com\/static\/newsroom\/img\/mt\/2014\/02\/AP900602030\/lead.jpg?n1kaz0\" width=\"570\" height=\"412\" \/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>Richard Drew\/AP<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The never-ending falling blocks of Tetris have caused innumerable people untold amounts of frustration. YouTube star Hank Green even has a song memorializing the evil of \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ApbvchiEdTY\">The Man Who Throws The Tetris Piece<\/a>.\u201d But a new\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0195666314000828\">study published in\u00a0<em>Appetite<\/em><\/a>\u00a0shows that the unwinnable game may be good for something other than wasting hours, days, lives\u2014reducing cravings.<\/p>\n<p>The Plymouth University researchers\u2014graduate student Jessica Skorka-Brown and professors Jackie Andrade and Jon May\u2014tested Elaborated Intrusion Theory, which says that cravings rely heavily on visual imagery. They write that this is the first test of that theory using naturally-occurring cravings. To capture the 119 participants\u2019 natural cravings (rather than artificially inducing them in the lab by having them evaluate chocolates or something), \u00a0asked them when they came in for the experiment if they were currently craving something, and to rate their craving from 1 to 100. Participants completed the Craving Experience Questionnaire, which measured the \u201cstrength, imagery, vividness, and intrusiveness of their current craving.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then participants sat down in front of a computer, which either loaded Tetris for them to play, or looked like it was going to load Tetris but never actually did. They either played Tetris, or didn\u2019t, for three minutes and then answered the same questions about their craving, describing what happened to the craving while they were playing the game (or, you know, sitting there).<\/p>\n<figure><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/cdn.theatlantic.com\/newsroom\/img\/posts\/2014\/02\/PV_Hkx\/ce8495e9a.gif\" width=\"294\" height=\"220\" \/><figcaption>(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=gbyCSFrrcsM\">YouTube<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Of the 119 people that participated, 80 reported craving something: 58 people wanted food or drink of some kind, 10 wanted caffeine, and 12 wanted nicotine. Their mean craving levels were \u201creasonably high,\u201d the researchers write. Playing Tetris reduced their cravings by about 24 percent. The relationship between playing the game and craving reduction remained statistically significant, even when the researchers accounted for a general lessening of the craving over time, or removed the people who were only slightly craving something.<\/p>\n<p>Obviously a 24 percent reduction doesn\u2019t mean the craving is\u00a0<em>gone,<\/em>\u00a0but neither is that nothing. \u201cTetris reduced the vividness and frequency of craving imagery, as well as craving intensity,\u201d the study reads. Tetris is a very visual task, which the researchers posit may be why it seems to impede the strength of craving imagery.<\/p>\n<p>Strange as it may seem, Tetris could actually be a helpful tool for those trying to quit smoking, or just avoid indulging in an unhealthy snack. Because despite its frustrations, Tetris is one of the most popular video games ever\u2014people like playing it. And if three minutes of arranging colored blocks could help curb a craving, it might be worth logging onto\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.freetetris.org\/game.php\">FreeTetris.org<\/a>\u00a0the next time you feel one hit.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Of the 119 people that participated, 80 reported craving something: 58 people wanted food or drink of some kind, 10 wanted caffeine, and 12 wanted nicotine. Their mean craving levels were \u201creasonably high,\u201d the researchers write. Playing Tetris reduced their cravings by about 24 percent. The relationship between playing the game and craving reduction remained &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/?p=1563\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Too cool&#8230; Tetris is good for you???<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,13,22,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-healthy-habits","category-nutrition","category-policy","category-rapid-learning-health-systems"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1563"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1563\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1565,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1563\/revisions\/1565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.panicola.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}