title: Educational games for brain health: revealing their unexplored potential through a neurocognitive approach.
abstract: Educational games link the motivational nature of games with learning of knowledge and skills. Here, we go beyond effects on these learning outcomes. We review two lines of evidence which indicate the currently unexplored potential of educational games to promote brain health: First, gaming with specific neurocognitive demands (e.g., executive control), and second, educational learning experiences (e.g., studying foreign languages) improve brain health markers. These markers include cognitive ability, brain function, and brain structure. As educational games allow the combination of specific neurocognitive demands with educational learning experiences, they seem to be optimally suited for promoting brain health. We propose a neurocognitive approach to reveal this unexplored potential of educational games in future research.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Education, Clinical and Biological Psychology, Ulm University , Ulm, Germany.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Fissler
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Education, Clinical and Biological Psychology, Ulm University , Ulm, Germany.
authors.forename: Iris-Tatjana
authors.initials: IT
authors.lastname: Kolassa
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychology and Education, Serious Games, Ulm University , Ulm, Germany.
authors.forename: Claudia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Schrader
keywords: brain function; brain health; brain structure; cognitive ability; education; educational games; gaming; serious games