BETA
This is a BETA experience. You may opt-out by clicking here

More From Forbes

Edit Story

Scientists Reveal How Watching 3D Is Like Brain Training

Following
This article is more than 8 years old.

Want to get an edge in sport? Always getting beaten to the punch by more alert work colleagues? In need of a boost to get you through another night of hard revision? Starting to feel old and forgetful? Then according to a new neurological experiment in London, you need to watch more 3D films.

And since I’ve just finished being a guinea pig in this brain-sharpening experiment myself, you can expect this article to be the best thing you’ve ever read. Probably.

The ground-breaking experiment was the brainchild of neuroscientist and Associate Lecturer at London’s Goldsmiths University Patrick Fagan, together with so-called ‘thrill engineer’ Professor Brendan Walker of the Thrill Laboratory. Fagan was interested in seeing what effects watching 3D might have on the brain once the 3D viewing experience was over, while Walker was keen to explore how much extra value people got while watching a film in 3D versus 2D. The results they obtained really are startling.

For instance, the researchers found from testing more than 100 people in the Vue Piccadilly Cinema that watching 3D produced, on average, a 23% increase in cognitive processing, and an 11% boost in reaction times - and these improvements in brain function were measured after the test subjects had finished watching 3D, not while they were watching it.

The research did uncover a small increase in brain function from watching 2D films too, but only a 11% rise in cognitive processing and just a 2% increase in reaction times, showing that 3D really does seem to reach the brain parts 2D just cannot reach.

The methodology used to obtain these results was impressively high-tech. First, subjects were given a short series of cognitive and memory tests on a computer. These tests included remembering ever-growing series of numbers; writing in 60 seconds as many words as they could think of beginning with a particular letter; decoding as fast as possible a series of symbols based on a translation key; finding re-occurrences of a specific number in a huge number grid; distinguishing as quickly as possible between the letters O and Q when they popped up on screen; and answering a series of complicatedly worded True/False questions based around a series of geometric shapes.

Next , subjects were fitted with many-tentacled Emotiv EPOC+ sensors capable of measuring activity in 14 different areas of the brain, and taken to watch the same film clip (the climactic battle in Big Hero 6). The only difference was that some test subjects watched the clip in 2D while the others watched it in 3D.

A visual representation of my brain doing stuff. Lovely.

During the viewing experience each subject’s brain activity was mapped, with the results showing that the 3D viewers enjoyed 7.3% more emotional engagement with the film clip than the 2D viewers (a sign of the extra 3D value Professor Walker and, no doubt, host Vue Cinemas was looking for).

As soon as the film clips were finished each test subject was led back to his or her computer and asked to repeat the cognitive tests. The differences in each subject’s performance between the first  and second series of tests then enabled the researchers to discern the relative cognitive boost enjoyed by the people who’d watched the 3D clip.

So why exactly does watching 3D deliver such a boost to your mental powers? Patrick Fagan explains: “First of all, 3D films are more exciting. They get people aroused. From an evolutionary perspective it’s the same as if a tiger jumps out at you; that too makes you aroused, as you have to think very quickly about whether you should run or fight. In such an excited state, your brain gets a boost.

“A second factor is positive emotions. When someone is happy they’re more relaxed and think faster.”

It’s important to stress that the measured brain benefits of 3D viewing could only be confirmed to last for around 20 minutes during this experiment. But even being able to give yourself an edge for 20 minutes from watching a few minutes of 3D is a pretty startling discovery - and Fagan is convinced that regular exposure to 3D could function in much the same way as brain-training games, ultimately delivering an impact way beyond a mere 20-minute boost.

“These findings are more significant than you might think,” he says. “It is a fact that people are living longer and there is a noticeable decline in cognitive brain function in old age which can impair future quality of life. There has never been a better time to look at ways to improve brain function. The initial results of this study indicate that 3D films may potentially play a role in slowing this decline.”

Which is certainly one of the better arguments in favour of 3D I've heard for a while.

If you’re wondering how my own test results fitted into the great scheme of things, they mostly strongly underlined the experiment’s findings. My reaction times after watching 3D increased by 6% (23.3ms); I managed 5% more unique words in the ‘words beginning with’ test; I managed to find a startling 41% more specific numbers in the large number grid; and I also managed to translate a striking 31% more symbols in the decoding test.

The only tests where watching 3D didn’t have a positive impact on my performance were remembering a string of numbers, where my results stayed the same, and the grammatical reasoning test, where rather embarrassingly I actually did 6% worse post 3D. But then nobody’s perfect, I guess. Even after watching 3D.

Follow me on Twitter or LinkedInCheck out my website