Play games with your kids this summer to boost their brains

Research shows that playing games can enhance our personal, social and emotional well-being, as well as our mental acuity.

A study conducted at Harvard Medical School in 2017 points out that loneliness can be more detrimental to health than smoking. Happiness, on the other hand, is strongly correlated with close relationships with family members and friends.

Playing both board games and video games with family members provide opportunities to get together and develop these relationships. They stimulate players physically, mentally and emotionally.

Games have also been found to change the brain structurally and functionally, according to many scientific studies. They can promote neurogenesis — the growth of new neurons in the brains. They can also promote neuroplasticity — changes in neural pathways and synapses that lead to structural changes in the brain.

These changes result in new brain cells and better connectivity among the different brain regions, thus enhancing mental skills such as memory, attention span, spatial intelligence, language learning ability and coordination.

Read the rest of the article via The Conversation