Abstract
Frequent action video game playing is known to influence perceptual, cognitive and emotional processes (Bailey & West, 2013; Dye et al., 2009; Li et al., 2009). Here, we examined the impact of habitual action video game exposure on the use of spatial frequencies (SF) during an object recognition task. Base images consisted of objects with low (e.g., a phone) or high (e.g., a gun) emotional value. All stimuli were equalized in spatial frequency content. Multiple spatial frequencies were sampled randomly for each stimulus on each trial. Images were presented for 300 ms, followed by a name corresponding or not to the object. A group of 18 non gamer subjects and a group of 17 gamer (>10 hours/week) subjects had to decide if the name matched the object as quickly as possible without making too many errors. To study the impact of different SFs on reaction time (RT), we performed linear multiple regressions on the random filters and RTs for correct responses in trials where object and name matched. For all subjects, SFs between 14.90 and 26.14 cycles per image (cpi) led to faster responses (p<0.05). Moreover, SFs between 14.60 and 24.44 cpi led to faster RTs for emotional objects (p<0.05), suggesting that the intrinsic affective value of an object influences its processing. We then computed an index comparing the use of high and low SFs for each group in every condition and compared it between groups to study possible differences. This revealed that low SFs of emotional objects led to faster recognition than high SFs in action video game players, while the opposite pattern was observed in non video game players (SF use indexes = -0.61 and 0.57 respectively; t31.62 = 2.29, p = 0.029). Habitual action video game exposure thus impacts internal representations of emotional objects.
Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2014