PLAYING video games after a harrowing event may help to reduce the effects of the trauma.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can trigger involuntary, distressing flashbacks in people who have been through trauma, such as soldiers or victims of rape.
at the University of Oxford and her team tried to spark minor flashbacks in people who did not have PTSD by showing them graphic videos of car crashes, drownings and surgery. Participants who played the video game Tetris for half an hour immediately afterwards had fewer flashbacks in the following week and scored lower on a standard PTSD test (PLoS One, ).
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Holmes says that playing Tetris may 鈥渦se up鈥� the brain鈥檚 visuospatial processing resources. This could temporarily lessen its ability to lay down memories with a strong visual component, such as those that can cause involuntary flashbacks of a horrific event. Crucially, there was no difference in volunteers鈥� ability to recall the event in narrative terms, so playing Tetris only seemed to prevent flashbacks.
Visuospatial tasks might one day be given to people after a traumatic event, but Holmes cautions that further research is needed.
