Web Surfing Improves Motor Skills 33
sciencehabit writes "Don't worry about watching all those cat videos on the Internet. You're not wasting time when you are at your computer — you're honing your fine-motor skills. A study (abstract) of people's ability to translate training that involves clicking and twiddling a computer mouse reveals that the brain can apply that expertise to other fine-motor tasks requiring the hands. The research involved some interesting methodology, including having Chinese migrant workers play the classic arcade game Pong for two hours a day."
Just web surfing? (Score:4, Informative)
I know that is the subject discussed, and I happen to agree with their conclusions, but what about gaming.
I had a 'mild' stroke about 4 years ago, and one of the things affected was my fine motor skills. :-(
Pre-stroke, I enjoyed working with my hands...model building, carpentry, welding/fabricating, leather-work, etc. I also had neat, legible handwriting....not any more.
I was also heavily involved with Fallout 3 and Fallout NV, both playing and making mods.
That endeavor really suffered!...but it was also the very best therapy I found, by far.
I am back up to my prior abilities (more Skyrim now though) with the gaming, modding, and my Blender and GIMP skills are improving even more from the added confidence.
So I'm grateful for that, and now depend HEAVILY on my various spell checkers to keep from appearing an illiterate idiot.
Alas, all is not roses...
I had to put my joystick away. I cannot regain enough hand to eye coordination to fly in games or simulators.
(I used to be an extremely deadly and precise 'pilot' in BF 1942 and it's Desert Combat mod-especially the AH-64 Apache; and kept a Win 98se box around just to play my favorite all time sim: SU-27 Flanker ver. 1.5 Squadron Commander's Edition"...the box is stored with the joystick now)