Exergames are new video games based on using the Wii. They use physical activity not sight as input and have been developed for use in the fight against obesity. Now they have been adapted so that children with visual impairments can play them, important because these children as a result of sight problems do not find it easy to take healthy exercise and so are at a higher risk of obesity.
Research team leader Eelke Folmer says the modification that enables the games, such as tennis, to be played without visual feedback use audio and vibro-tactile feedback. Like standard Wii games these new ones can be played against other people or the computer. So far these games have been very successful in getting sight impaired people to exercise vigorously, though the sample sizes have been very small.
To play the VI Fit games, a user would need a Wii remote and a Windows PC with bluetooth support or a USB bluetooth dongle. The games can be downloaded using instructions at www.vifit.org. The games are not affiliated with or endorsed by Nintendo.
Posts archived in Media psychology
Train your baby to grow up a genius? That is the idea behind a load of commercial stimulus materials such as the Disney Baby Einstein videos, books, flashcards, toys, and so on (seemingly anything marketable ). We have described these products on page 219 of the A2 Complete Companion, along with a study that showed that watching the DVDs can lead to a poorer developmental outcome. Now Disney is refunding the cost of the videos to anyone who purchased them!! The refunds are because a range of studies have shown that watching TV is potentially harmful for the under-2s, and linked early TV watching to attentional problems at around age 7. It would be interesting to know if the brain’s developing connections are affected by environmental input, something which has very tricky ethical issues but which might be abe to be done as a natural experiment. The emphasis on stimulating cognitive development is still on positive adult-child interactions.
If you go here, you can download a copy of one of the most famous radio broadcasts ever made: Orson Welles 1938 adaptation of ‘War Of The Worlds’, a drama that caused mass panic and hysteria when it was broadcast. Here’s what happened:
“On the evening of Sunday, October 30, 1938 – a month after the Munich – Orson Welles of the Mercury Theatre gave, over the Columbia Broadcasting System, a scheduled radio dramatization of an old fantasy by H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds. To make it vivid, he arranged it to simulate a current news broadcast. After an announcer had clearly explained the nature of the program, a voice gave a prosaic weather forecast; then another voice said that the program would be continued from a hotel, with dance music; shortly this music was interrupted by a “flash” to the effect that a professor at “Mount Jennings Observatory,” Chicago, reported seeing explosions at regular intervals on the planted Mars; then the listeners were “returned” in orthodox fashion “to the music of Ramon Raquello…a tune that never loses favor, the popular ‘Star Dust’”; then came an interview with an imaginary Princeton professor, with more information about disturbances on Mars – whereupon a series of further “news bulletins” described the arrival of Martians in huge metal cylinders which landed in New Jersey. The broadcast gathered speed, bulleting following bulletin. More Martians landed – an army of them, which quickly defeated the New Jersey State Militia. Presently the Martina attack was vividly described as being general all over the United States, with the population of New York evacuating the city and Martian heat-rays and flame-throwers and other diabolical devices causing terrific destruction, till all was laid to waste.”
How are juvenile delinquents portrayed in modern culture? (indeed do we even use the term ‘delinquent’ anymore?) The contemporary media paints a picture of surly youths hanging around on street corners drinking ‘alcopops’ and wearing hoodies. However, things were obviously quite different back in 1925, when eminient psychologist Sir Cyril Burt used the following illustration in his book ‘The Young Delinquent”:
.
If you click on the ‘read rest of entry‘ link at the end of this post to look at the rest of the pictures, you’ll discover that back then three piece suits and working mens caps were very ‘street’ for boys, whereas young ladies were smoking on the dancefloor and hanging about on enormous stuffed horses…..
….. terrifying……
All pictures from Burt, C.L. (1925). The young delinquent. London: University of London Press, with many thanks to Saxon (aged 43 11/12) of the excellent ‘Too Many Pipes’ for the original text.
(Also, talking of delinquents, have you looked at ‘Contemporary Mottled Sheep’ ?)