Stressed Out? Why Not Try Some Simple Video Gaming?


A Research study by PopCap Games, the biggest study of casual gamers ever, suggests that 88% of all every day gamers "play to relieve stress", and 41% said that it is their biggest reason for playing video games to begin with. In fact, exploration of games has pointed that playing a simple video game for 30 minutes is a tremendous way to relieve tension. An informal game is a game that is easy to play but hard to master. It could be as easy as Solitaire or Freecell. These games are simple to understand and only include a few simple rules.

Playing for 15 to 30 minutes a day will help assist your psyche in not thinking about certain things, this will result in a "break from reality" which will then lead to less stress. And this can be done with any video game not just one or the other. It is a positive benefit to take a break from reality and dumb down for a short period of time. Personally for me, I work at home, and I often find myself leaving the desk for just a wee bit to take a break and play a game, especially on those really stressful days. Heck you can even play games if you don't have a console, simply visit a few Arcadia sites available online. You can play these games right from your computer, it's completely free and you can play whenever you want, which in some of your cases might be a problem, so try to control yourself! This isn't a form of procrastination so don't use it for that! This is a form of stress relief, use it wisely.

People have all sorts of games that de-stress them, for me it's all about the Need For Speed games, crashing my Ferrari into a bus station going 200 miles per hour is de-stressing! For you it might be scrabble or a shooting game, who knows! The point is to block out any work, worries, stress, tension, arguments, fights, etc, from your mind, and just be free. Some would say this is a form of Yoga, and I guess if you want to categorize them as being the same thing you can.

Also, if a study by a major gaming company just won't do it for you and you are sort of suspicious considering they are the ones that paid for the study? Another study was done as well in October of 2007 and in 2004 and it showed that on average there is a 17% reduction in cortisol production. Of course cortisol is an important hormone in the body, secreted by the adrenal glands and involved in a few essential functions in the body, however, sometimes cortisol is also noted as the "stress hormone" because it's also secreted in higher levels during the body's "fight or flight" response to stress, and is accountable for several stress-related alterations in the body. So if video games can lessen this hormone that in turn means you have less of a chance of stressing out or more of a chance of de-stressing with video games!