For years, playing video games was given a bad rap with all the scientific reports, articles and research listing its negative effects on kids. But a new study sets the record straight on whether or not the activity really affects young children’s cognitive abilities.

多年来，所有的科学报告、文章和研究都列出了电子游戏对孩子的负面影响，给电子游戏带来了不好的名声。但一项新的研究明确了这项活动是否真的会影响幼儿的认知能力。

In a study published in the Journal of Media Psychology, researchers addressed the controversy over playing video games and challenged what’s been presented in the media for years about how video games could be bad for cognitive development among kids.

在《媒体心理学杂志》上发表的一项研究中，研究人员解决了关于玩电子游戏的争议，并对媒体多年来关于电子游戏如何不利于儿童认知发展的说法提出了质疑。

The team examined the video gaming habits of 160 diverse urban public-school preteen students to check the cognitive abilities of the age group less studied in previous research. The participants (70% from low-income households) reported playing video games for an average of 2.5 hours per day. The heaviest gamers in the sample played 4.5 hours per day.

研究小组调查了160名不同的城市公立学校学龄前学生的电子游戏习惯，来印证之前研究较少的年龄组的认知能力。参与者(70%来自低收入家庭)报告平均每天玩电子游戏2.5小时。最长每天玩4.5小时。

The researchers subjected the preteen students to the standardized Cognitive Ability Test 7, also called CogAT, to evaluate their verbal, quantitative, and nonverbal or spatial skills. They then checked if their performance on the test was affected by their video game-playing habits.

研究人员让这些青春期前的学生接受标准化认知能力测试7，也被称为CogAT，以评估他们的语言，数量，非语言或空间技能。然后，研究了他们在测试中的表现是否受到了玩电子游戏习惯的影响。

“Our studies turned up no such links, regardless of how long the children played and what types of games they chose,” Jie Zhang, an associate professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Houston College of Education who was part of the research team, said in a press release.

张杰是休斯顿大学教育学院课程与教学副教授，也是该研究小组的成员，他在一份新闻稿中说：""我们的研究没有发现这种联系，无论孩子们玩了多长时间，也无论他们选择什么类型的游戏。”

“Overall, neither duration of play nor choice of video game genres had significant correlations with the CogAT measures. That result shows no direct linkage between video game playing and cognitive performance, despite what had been assumed,” added lead researcher May Jadalla, a professor in the School of Teaching and Learning at Illinois State University.

"总的来说，无论是玩游戏的时间，还是游戏类型的选择，都与CogAT的测量结果没有显著的相关性。 这一结果表明，玩电子游戏和认知表现之间没有直接的联系，尽管大家之前一直认为有。”伊利诺伊州立大学教学学院教授、首席研究员梅·贾达拉补充道。

Though the findings could help children justify their video gaming habits to their parents, the study also showed a downside of the recreational activity. Contrary to what some developers claim in their marketing materials, certain types of games advertised to enhance cognitive skills did not show measurable effects in children in the study.

尽管这些发现可以帮助孩子们向父母证明他们玩电子游戏的习惯，但研究也显示了这种娱乐活动的负面影响。与一些开发商在营销中宣扬的相反，在这项研究中，某些宣传可以增强认知技能的游戏，并没有在儿童中显示出可衡量的效果。

“The current study found results that are consistent with previous research showing that types of gameplay that seem to augment cognitive functions in young adults don’t have the same impact in much younger children,” C. Shawn Green, a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, explained.

威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校心理学系教授c·肖恩·格林解释说:“目前的研究发现的结果与之前的研究一致，即那些似乎能增强年轻人认知功能的游戏类型，对年龄更小的孩子没有同样的影响。”

The team also warned that even though they found no negative impact on the kids’ cognitive abilities, their video gaming habits made them miss more productive activities, such as homework.

研究小组还警告说，尽管他们没有发现电子游戏对孩子的认知能力有负面影响，但他们的电子游戏习惯让他们错过了更有成效的活动，比如家庭作业。