Neural Correlation of Brain Activities and Gaming Using Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy and Iowa Gambling Task

The aim of this research is to analyze brain activity using fNIRS and the Iowa Gambling Task to identify the characteristics of behavior in gaming. Previous studies showed that playing video games influences the functionality of the prefrontal cortex, suggesting that playing games affects cognition. Repeated-measures ANOVA was used to assess the pre-frontal cortex activity of the brain in the two regions of interest (left hemisphere, right hemisphere) during the experiment to determine the changes in prefrontal cortex activation levels in the regions of interest. The same statistical technique was used on the cognitive task to see if more cards from favorable decks were picked by participants as the task progressed. We found that during the completion of the cognitive task, both regions of interest were activated, specifically, the changes in concentration of oxy-hemoglobin in the left hemisphere was significantly higher than the right hemisphere, and participants tended to choose a significantly higher number of cards from the favorable decks during the end of the cognitive task.