No, there is no evidence for a link between video games and Alzheimer’s disease

Here we go again. In a study published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, a team of Canadian researchers compared the way a group of regular gamers learn and pay attention to a group of non-gamers. Not surprisingly they found that the gamers behave differently. They also used a technique called electroencephalography to show that a brain wave called the N2PC is different in gamers, which fits with their behavioural results.

So far this is all pretty sensible, so where is the link to Alzheimer’s disease? In fact, the researchers didn’t look at dementia or perform any clinical tests. But they nevertheless embark on a series of logical leaps, which go like this:

1. The type of learning shown by the gamers has been associated in previous studies with increased use of a brain region called the caudate nucleus

2. Increased use of the caudate nucleus can be associated with reduced volume of the hippocampus

3. Reduced volume of the hippocampus can be associated with increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease

4. Therefore (take a deep breath) video gaming could increase risk of Alzheimer’s disease

Convinced?

As usual, the news headlines conflate this conjecture with fact. “Call of Duty increases risk of Alzheimer’s disease”, said the Telegraph. “Video game link to psychiatric disorders suggested by study”, reported the Guardian. The Daily Mail posed the problem as a question, “Could video games increase your risk of Alzheimer’s?”, reminding us that whenever a news headline asks a question, the answer is no.

We know that when science news is hyped, most of the hype is already present in the press releases issued by universities. This case is no exception - the press release was issued by the Douglas Mental Health University Institute, and unsurprisingly it focuses almost entirely on the tenuous link to Alzheimer’s disease.

The press release also includes a statement from the lead researcher that is a clear exaggeration. Dr Gregory West is quoted as saying “we also found that gamers rely on the caudate nucleus to a greater degree than non-gamers”. Actually they didn’t find this at all, because their study didn’t measure activity in the caudate nucleus. Instead it measured a type of behaviour that previous studies have associated with activity in the caudate nucleus. There is a world of difference between these two, and readers would do well to take these latest claims with a generous helping of salt.

So once again, we’re faced with a situation in which a study that tenuously claims a negative effect of playing video games is vastly overhyped, both in the press release and the subsequent media coverage. We can do better than this.

Source article:

West GL, Drisdelle BL, Konishi K, Jackson J, Jolicoeur P, Bohbot VD. 2015 Habitual action video game playing is associated with caudate nucleus-dependent navigational strategies. Proc. R. Soc. B, 2014, 2952. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2014.2952