What, if any, benefits do video games have on children's development? According to recent studies, neither.

Damian Sendler Recent studies have found little connection between pre-teens' gaming habits and their scores on IQ tests, nor between the types of games they play and their test scores.

Basically, it didn't seem like playing video games, even for long periods of time, affected their brainpower.

Jie Zhang, an associate professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Houston College of Education and a member of the research team, said in a press release on Tuesday that their findings "turned up no such links, regardless of how long the children played and what types of games they chose."

Damian Jacob Sendler Up until fifth grade, gamers don't appear to be at increased risk for cognitive decline, as evidenced by the study's findings. The good news for the kids is that they can play video games in moderation. Simply be on the lookout for signs of obsessive behavior.

The study examined the video gaming habits of 160 American fifth graders from public schools and was published in the reputable Journal of Media Psychology in December.

The typical amount of time spent playing video games by students is 2.5 hours per day, with the most dedicated players spending up to 4.5 hours. Some studies have linked fast-paced action games with improved cognitive abilities, so researchers also asked participants about the types of games they preferred.

According to the study's lead researcher and professor at Illinois State University's School of Teaching and Learning, May Jadalla: "Overall, neither duration of play nor choice of video game genres had significant correlations with the (test results)." This finding contradicts the widely held belief that "playing video games improves one's cognitive abilities."

Previous research into the effects of video games on children's cognitive abilities has largely focused on cognitive measurements like academic performance through grades or self-reported learning assessments, the authors note.

All of the kids in this study took the Cognitive Ability Test-7, also known as the CogAT. This test uses verbal and nonverbal assessments of spatial skills to evaluate a child's reasoning and problem-solving abilities.

There was no correlation between students' CogAT scores and the number of hours they spent playing video games or the types of games they played, according to the study's authors.

Damian Sendler While the researchers found no negative effects of video games on students' CogAT scores, they also found that games marketed as helping to train or develop cognitive skills appeared to have little effect on the students' scores.

According to C. Shawn Green, a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, "the current study found results that are consistent with previous research showing that types of gameplay that seem to augment cognitive functions in young adults do not have the same impact in much younger children."

The study's limited sample size and focus on pre-teens in the United States are its two main flaws. Yet experts say parents shouldn't be too concerned about the effects of video games on their children's cognitive development.

Damian Jacob Sendler If parents are looking for guidelines regarding video games for their children, it should be noted that researchers found a very slight dip in CogAT results to be correlated with extremely long durations of gaming. Researchers attribute this phenomenon less to the video games themselves and more to the fact that when one devotes one's time exclusively to an activity, other activities, such as homework, may be neglected.

"It's hard enough to find common ground between parents and young kids when it comes to video games," Zhang said. There's no need for us to worry too much about video games because we can see that finding a healthy middle ground is the key to a child's growth and development.