Really proud to have contributed to this review. It feels like a step toward validating an idea that is still underexplored: video games are a rich and largely untapped resource for cognitive and behavioral scientists.
We review the few examples in the cognitive science literature where scientists have used video games to enhance scalability, ecological validity and public engagement.
Let us know if we have missed any!
⚠️New review on video games for cognitive citizen science!
"From Players to Participants: Citizen Science and Video Games to Understand Cognition"
arxiv.org/abs/2604.24321
Max from @glitchers.bsky.social (creator of Sea Hero Quest) and @edgardubourg.bsky.social (working at the interface between game dev and scientists) provide insights into creating successful video games for scientific research and explain why this approach is still so rare.
Many thanks to all co-authors, in particular PhD student Syrine Salouhou (not on Bsky), @edgardubourg.bsky.social, @glitchers.bsky.social, @hugospiers.bsky.social
My favourite example of the benefits of using video games in cognitive science:
🚨 New publication in collab with Shayna Rosenbaum's lab:
"Aphantasia is associated with spatial memory and navigation difficulties in complex virtual environments"
Our test SeaHeroQuest shows a correlation between nav performance and mental imagery (VVIQ)
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
