Video games have many effects on the brain, and they are mainly positive effects. According to the American Physiological Association (APA), shooter video games improve the player’s capability to think about objects in three dimensions. That is one of many positive effects of gaming.

Pop culture stereotypes has left a poor taste on gamers, making them look like awkward rejects with no social life, but that is actually not true. Three different institutions in the UK and Canada conducted their own test to discover how common antisocial behavior is among gamers.

It was revealed that gamers are actually one of the most social groups out there when communicating, and some of the most friendly, talkative people out in the sociable world. In fact, while observing researchers admitted that they formed stronger relationships due to their love for video games.

The APA states that quick and easy games can, “improve the players mood and promote relaxation and ward off anxiety.”

“If playing video games simply makes people happier, this seems to be a fundamental emotional benefit to consider,” Lead author Isabela Granic, PhD, of Radboud University Nijmegen in The Netherlands.

According to gamedesigning.org, video games make you better at decision-making.

“Action video games are fast-paced, and there are peripheral images and events popping up, and disappearing,” said Shawn Green, from The University of Rochester. “These video games are teaching people to become better at taking sensory data, and translating it into correct decisions.”

One of Green’s colleagues said that shooter games improve many of our low level perceptual functions.

Video games also improve hand-eye coordination. Scientists at the University of Texas medical branch brought a group of high school students, college students, and medical residents to see who could outperform the other players.

They found out that the high school students did the best. The scientists said the reason the high school students outperformed the other groups was because the high school kids played for two hours a day.