(Note: newer studies suggest this effect is much milder than previous research once led us to believe, but it’s still an idea worth exploring. On with the show. -SciBabe)
In August of 2022, my brother died suddenly. I did a lot of things to cope, questioning in the moment if anything was going to be helpful long term. Therapy, adjusting my antidepressant levels, app-guided meditation (my therapist assures me that it counts). One of the things I did to occupy my racing mind that made me second guess if I had healthy coping mechanisms? Playing endless hours of video games because it was literally anything else for my brain to do.
Turns out science says to play your fucking video games.
Today’s Moment of Science… Fighting trauma with Tetris.
Let’s be clear, it’s not an excuse to skip your meds and immobilize on the couch with a controller in your hand in lieu of therapy, meds, and at least occasional bathing. But the studies are compelling.
Memory consolidation is what happens when the glitchy computer running your meatsuit converts some shit that happened into long term memory. Then there’s reconsolidation, which is kinda what happens when you take a memory out of the box to play with it. It never quite goes back in the way it came out, so the next time you recall that event? It’s memory v2.0, the version that your brain changed on you just a smidge the last time you thought about it.
There are different schools of thought on how memory works, but that’s for another day.
Most of the time, those long term memories are stored away waiting to be retrieved. Then there are those more troublesome memories, the ones that show up at 4pm when you have a deadline to whisper in your ear “I know it’s been years, how ‘bout now for some ugly crying?”
If those unmanageable memories could either be reconsolidated into something more user-friendly or stay locked away from where our minds actively prod at them, they wouldn’t be such a problem. Intrusive memories, often with visual flashbacks, are a common symptom of PTSD. There are theories about why this happens, including a soup of chemical and hormonal suspects, but until the science is settled? I’m sticking with “our brains are assholes.”
The question of how to prevent PTSD might first sound like a starry-eyed quest to stop all bad things from happening. But shit happens, so how do you stop it from turning into a memory that’s out to keep fucking up your life?
Tetris.
Researchers hypothesized that newly forming traumatic memories could possibly be disrupted by performing a visuospatial cognitive task. The brain can only do so much at a time, and by actively engaging it like this during those precious memory forming hours, it could work as a kind of ‘cognitive vaccine.’
After showing research volunteers a traumatic film with scenes of real injury and death, half the volunteers were asked to play Tetris for ten minutes, half were given no task. A week later, they were asked to report on the number of flashbacks they had from visuals in the film.
There was a significant reduction in the group that played Tetris. They also conducted a study to see if a video game with completely dissimilar features would work. I regret to inform you that ‘Pub Quiz’ did not show the same effect on traumatic memories as Tetris.
The research is still relatively new, and no formal treatments have been recommended based on the studies. But next time I go through some bullshit that I don’t want to be haunted by again, that shit’s being cognitively throat-punched by my favorite video game from the USSR.
This has been your Moment of Science, already conducting studies into how well Witcher 3 and Skyrim work for this. Yeah… studies. Mmmhmm.
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