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The acute cognitive benefits of casual exergame play

Published: 05 May 2012 Publication History

Abstract

Acute cognitive benefits, such as temporary improvements in concentration, can result from as few as ten minutes of exercise; however, most people do not take exercise breaks throughout the day. To motivate people to receive the cognitive benefits of exercising in short bursts multiple times per day, we designed an engaging casual exergame. To determine whether there are cognitive benefits after playing our game, we conducted two studies to compare playing ten minutes of our casual exergame to a sedentary version of the game or exercise on a treadmill. We found acute cognitive benefits of the casual exergame over the sedentary version (but not treadmill exercise), demonstrated by significantly improved performance on two cognitive tests that require focus and concentration. Significant improvements were also found in participants' affective states after playing the casual exergame. Finally, our casual exergame produces similar exertion levels to treadmill exercise, but is perceived as more fun.

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Cited By

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  • (2024)Exploring the Psychological Effects and Physical Exertion of Using Different Movement Interactions in Casual Exergames That Promote Active Microbreaks: Quasi-Experimental StudyJMIR Serious Games10.2196/5590512(e55905)Online publication date: 26-Aug-2024
  • (2024)Enhancing perspective-taking and empathy in children with autism spectrum disorder through asymmetric VR games and peer collaborationInteractive Learning Environments10.1080/10494820.2024.2351174(1-31)Online publication date: 14-May-2024
  • (2024)Changes in concentration performance and alternating attention after short-term virtual reality training in E-athletes: a pilot studyScientific Reports10.1038/s41598-024-59539-w14:1Online publication date: 17-Apr-2024
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    CHI '12: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
    May 2012
    3276 pages
    ISBN:9781450310154
    DOI:10.1145/2207676
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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    Published: 05 May 2012

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    Author Tags

    1. affect
    2. casual game
    3. cognitive benefits
    4. exercise
    5. exergame

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    • (2024)Exploring the Psychological Effects and Physical Exertion of Using Different Movement Interactions in Casual Exergames That Promote Active Microbreaks: Quasi-Experimental StudyJMIR Serious Games10.2196/5590512(e55905)Online publication date: 26-Aug-2024
    • (2024)Enhancing perspective-taking and empathy in children with autism spectrum disorder through asymmetric VR games and peer collaborationInteractive Learning Environments10.1080/10494820.2024.2351174(1-31)Online publication date: 14-May-2024
    • (2024)Changes in concentration performance and alternating attention after short-term virtual reality training in E-athletes: a pilot studyScientific Reports10.1038/s41598-024-59539-w14:1Online publication date: 17-Apr-2024
    • (2023)The Potential of Seated and Standing Short Duration Casual Exergames to Increase Positive AffectProceedings of the 26th International Academic Mindtrek Conference10.1145/3616961.3616964(25-34)Online publication date: 3-Oct-2023
    • (2023)Liopep: A Gamified Casual Exergame Application to Help Office Workers Not be Active Couch Potatoes2023 IEEE 11th International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH)10.1109/SeGAH57547.2023.10253779(1-8)Online publication date: 28-Aug-2023
    • (2023)The Effect of Assigned Goals in Casual Exergames on Performance, Exertion and Enjoyment2023 IEEE 11th International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH)10.1109/SeGAH57547.2023.10253767(1-7)Online publication date: 28-Aug-2023
    • (2023)The Attractiveness and Effectiveness of Upper Body and Full Body Casual Exergame Controllers2023 IEEE 11th International Conference on Serious Games and Applications for Health (SeGAH)10.1109/SeGAH57547.2023.10253764(1-8)Online publication date: 28-Aug-2023
    • (2023)Game-based Learning approach and Serious Games to learn while you play2023 IEEE World Engineering Education Conference (EDUNINE)10.1109/EDUNINE57531.2023.10102872(1-6)Online publication date: 12-Mar-2023
    • (2023)Creating a treadmill running video game with smartwatch interactionMultimedia Tools and Applications10.1007/s11042-023-17752-183:19(57709-57729)Online publication date: 12-Dec-2023
    • (2023)Using MediaPipe Machine Learning to Design Casual Exertion Games to Interrupt Prolonged Sedentary LifestyleHCI in Games10.1007/978-3-031-35930-9_16(237-251)Online publication date: 9-Jul-2023
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