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<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Spotlight Advanced. I'm Alice Irrazari.

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<v Speaker 2>And I'm Colin Lowva. Spotlight uses a special English method

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<v Speaker 2>of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand no

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<v Speaker 2>matter where in the world they live.

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<v Speaker 1>The car crash changed the girl's life. Her body did

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<v Speaker 1>not have many injuries, but the memories from the accident

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<v Speaker 1>still terrify her. They come at times she does not expect.

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<v Speaker 1>She tries to think about something else when they happen,

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<v Speaker 1>but these memories stop her other thoughts. It is as

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<v Speaker 1>if she is living through the accident all over again.

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<v Speaker 2>The girl is developing post trauma to extress disorder, or PTSD.

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<v Speaker 2>This is a condition where memories of life threatening events

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<v Speaker 2>take over long after they happened. These memories, called flashbacks,

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<v Speaker 2>seem very real. People with PTSD experience many flashbacks in

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<v Speaker 2>their lifetime. They relive their accidents over and over again.

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<v Speaker 1>Whenever she has these memories, they have her play a

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<v Speaker 1>video game called Tetris. Tetris seems to be the one

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<v Speaker 1>thing that she is now thinking about. The game helps

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<v Speaker 1>her think about something other than her flashbacks. It makes

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<v Speaker 1>them seem less frightening. But experts believe that Tetris may

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<v Speaker 1>have an even greater effect. It may stop her from

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<v Speaker 1>getting post traumatic stress disorder at all. Today, a spotlight

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<v Speaker 1>is on Tetris, the healing game.

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<v Speaker 2>Tetris is a simple game created in nineteen eighty five

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<v Speaker 2>by Alix Pagetknoth. The game was designed so that almost

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<v Speaker 2>anyone could play. A player turns different shaped blocks. As

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<v Speaker 2>the blocks fall down the screen, the goal is to

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<v Speaker 2>fit these blocks together in perfectly level lines. When a

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<v Speaker 2>player forms these level lines, the blocks flash and disappear.

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<v Speaker 1>This is called clearing a line. Clearing lines gains a

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<v Speaker 1>player points. It also provides more room on screen to

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<v Speaker 1>line up blocks. The game ends when the blocks reach

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<v Speaker 1>the top of the screen. The blocks fall faster as

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<v Speaker 1>the game goes on, making it more difficult.

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<v Speaker 2>These simple rules made Tetris a success. Today, the series

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<v Speaker 2>has sold over five hundred and twenty million copies of

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<v Speaker 2>the game. It is the second highest selling video game

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<v Speaker 2>in history. Pajetnov spoke about the success of Tetris with

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<v Speaker 2>the gaming website Polygon.

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<v Speaker 3>In lots of games you go in and destroy things.

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<v Speaker 3>In Tetris, you have the feeling that you are building

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<v Speaker 3>something all the time. It is useful and positive. It

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<v Speaker 3>makes you feel smart.

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<v Speaker 1>But Tetris is more than just fun and good feelings.

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<v Speaker 1>Emily Holmes is a teacher at the Karolinska Institute, a

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<v Speaker 1>university in Sweden. She believed that Tetris's simple rules could

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<v Speaker 1>be useful for treating PTSD. In twenty seventeen, she carried

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<v Speaker 1>out a test on people who had been in car accidents.

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<v Speaker 1>She asked them to reach remember the accident, then she

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<v Speaker 1>asked them to play Tetris for fifteen minutes. The people

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<v Speaker 1>who played Tetris were less likely to get PTSD, their

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<v Speaker 1>flashbacks were less intense.

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<v Speaker 2>Experts are not yet sure why Tetris has this effect,

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<v Speaker 2>but much of it may have to do with how

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<v Speaker 2>image based Tetris is. Tetris occupies most of the image

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<v Speaker 2>centers of a person's mind when playing the game. Flashbacks

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<v Speaker 2>are also very image based. Picturing a painful memory involves

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<v Speaker 2>the same area of the brain. A person cannot concentrate

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<v Speaker 2>on both the game and the memories at the same time.

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<v Speaker 2>Playing Tetris stops or blocks the memories from happening.

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<v Speaker 1>This block is important, and for people who have gone

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<v Speaker 1>through intense mental injury. The more people reexperience the events

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<v Speaker 1>that hurt them. The more those memories stay with them,

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<v Speaker 1>their flashbacks become more difficult to get rid of. They

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<v Speaker 1>may even fear the flashbacks themselves. This leaves sufferers in

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<v Speaker 1>continuous states of worry. They might push away help for

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<v Speaker 1>fear it will hurt them. Doctor Lali Eyadurai is a

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<v Speaker 1>teacher at the University of Oxford. She wrote in the

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<v Speaker 1>journal Molecular Psychiatry.

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<v Speaker 4>This first week after injury can be important for our patients.

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<v Speaker 4>They have to go home, recover and look after themselves.

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<v Speaker 4>These can be hard to do if you are getting

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<v Speaker 4>memories of the injury, often several times a day.

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<v Speaker 2>Tetris, the studies suggests, is a good way to prevent

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<v Speaker 2>those memories from forming at all, or it can at

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<v Speaker 2>least limit the difficulty that these memories cause.

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<v Speaker 1>The game may also help with other issues. In twenty fifteen,

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<v Speaker 1>scientists from the University of Queensland carried a study on

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<v Speaker 1>some of its students. The study worked to see if

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<v Speaker 1>Tetris could affect desires for drugs or alcohol. Students were

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<v Speaker 1>asked to play Tetris for three minutes whenever they experienced

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<v Speaker 1>these desires. They reported their levels of desire before and

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<v Speaker 1>after playing.

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<v Speaker 2>The results were similar to the study on post traumatic

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<v Speaker 2>stress disorder. Playing Tetris lessened the desire for things like drugs, alcohol, sex,

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<v Speaker 2>and food. The effect was the same for each desire.

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<v Speaker 2>Tetris reduced desire no matter how how many times a

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<v Speaker 2>student played. Professor Jackie Onrawday is a teacher at Plymouth

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<v Speaker 2>University in the United Kingdom who helps run the study.

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<v Speaker 2>She spoke about it on her university's website.

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<v Speaker 5>We think the Tetris effect happens because desire involves imagining.

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<v Speaker 5>You picture, eating a particular substance, or being satisfied by

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<v Speaker 5>a particular action. Tetris is graphically interesting. It takes over

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<v Speaker 5>the mental processes that support imagery. It is hard to

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<v Speaker 5>imagine something else vividly and play Tetris at the same time.

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<v Speaker 1>Playing Tetris may even help cure lazy eye. This condition

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<v Speaker 1>takes place when a person's brain cannot take in information

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<v Speaker 1>from one eye. Eventually, the brain stops trusting that eye.

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<v Speaker 1>It closes the eye off, causing sight loss. That eye

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<v Speaker 1>is said to be lazy. It does not work as

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<v Speaker 1>much as the other eye.

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<v Speaker 2>Sometimes an operation is the only way to correct lazy eye,

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<v Speaker 2>but often the eye can be trained. The more patients

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<v Speaker 2>use the weak eye, the more effective it becomes. A

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<v Speaker 2>study released in twenty nineteen suggested that playing Tetris is

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<v Speaker 2>an effective eye training method. The strong images of the

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<v Speaker 2>game forced the eyes to work together. Eyesight improved in

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<v Speaker 2>patients for thirty minutes after playing the game. Playing the

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<v Speaker 2>game for fifteen minutes a day saw permanent improvement after

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<v Speaker 2>just two weeks.

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<v Speaker 1>Tetris may not be the only game to have these advantages.

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<v Speaker 1>Other games like it may have similar effects. Research into

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<v Speaker 1>the therapeutic possibilities for video games is just beginning, but

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<v Speaker 1>these studies suggest that Tetris is more than just a

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<v Speaker 1>game one day Tetus may be a part in certain

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<v Speaker 1>therapies for helping and healing many people.

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<v Speaker 2>Have you ever played Tetris? What do you think about it?

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<v Speaker 2>You can leave a comment on our website or emailers

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<v Speaker 2>at radio at Radio English dot net. You can also

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<v Speaker 2>comment on Facebook at Facebook dot com slash Spotlight Radio.

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<v Speaker 1>The writer of this program was Dan Christman. The producer

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<v Speaker 1>was Michyo Osaki. The voices you heard were from the

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<v Speaker 1>United States and the United Kingdom. All quotes were adapted

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<v Speaker 1>for this program and voiced by Spotlight. You can listen

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<v Speaker 1>to this pro program again and read it on the

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<v Speaker 1>internet at www dot Radio English dot net. This program

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<v Speaker 1>is called Tetris the Healing Game.

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<v Speaker 2>You can also get our programs delivered directly to your

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<v Speaker 2>Android or Apple device through our free official Spotlight English app.

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<v Speaker 2>We hope you can join us again for the next

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<v Speaker 2>Spotlight program. Goodbye,