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Playing Online Games vs. Humans Makes a Greater Challenge?A new research shows that the online gamer's brain respond differently when playing online games against a human competitor than when playing against a computer. Those differences might even explain some of the dissimilarities between male and female gamers.
The research titled "Are women better mindreaders? Sex differences in neural correlates of mentalizing detected with functional MRI", scanned the brains of equal number of males and females as the two groups were busy playing online games. While all of them were playing against a computer, only half of them were aware of it; the other half was convinced they are playing flesh and blood opponents.
The MRI scans results of all interrogees showed that the most active areas of their brains were the ones that enact the theory of mind network (i.e. the ability to attribute self and others' mental states): the anterior cingulate cortex, the medial prefrontal cortex and the temporoparietal junction. The anterior cingulate cortex, the medial prefrontal cortex worked overtime when the players were told a human contestant is fronting them, especially among the male gamers.
In other words, when people play online games against a human player, they make a further effort to imagine his thinking, intentions, knowledge, etc, then when they confront a programmed device; and that men, whether because their stereotypically stronger drive to win or due to their (stereotypical) disability to imagine others' feelings and other expressions of mental states, make a greater effort than their female counterparts.
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