Why does real life not provide the same gratification hormones?
Obviously it should make me feel much happier and accomplished to do literally anything constructive with my time, even more so when my bank account total goes up from getting paid, than to have a mediocre time getting dunked on in an online shooter, but it doesn’t work that way…
Are there any studies done on this? I know there are apps and systems that attempt to do just this, gameifying real life chores with moderate success. Why does this not work as well as one would expect? The psychology should be very interesting.
Doing something constructive feels really good once you’ve finished and gotten a reward for accomplishing it. Games hijack this gratification system and instead trickle little rewards at you constantly so you always feel like you’re accomplishing something.
Games are manipulating you and making you feel happy about progress that happens inside a game that isnt even real. But it works.
Real life is designed to be debt slavery, and for you to constantly run faster to get an education, a good job and a family. My girlfriend feels she is getting enough satisfaction in life from our kid and her gardening interest. I’m not feeling that way personally, and I wish there was something more exciting to look forward to, because life can be pretty boring if you don’t feel excited about work and family.
I feel like games are a way to forget the boring real life for a while. But they are clearly manipulative.
Real life is boring because there is no feeling of any meaning to what we do. If we were living in a star trek society where you could be proud of humanity and what we are accomplishing, it would be easier to feel like we are doing good. But there is just no higher purpose to any of our current activities. So it’s boring.
Human leaders are super primitive as well, and just depressing to watch. They are the worst of people, but being advertised as leaders.
Sitting is boring, emails are boring, not owning capital is boring. Religion is not, plants are not, sunlight is not. Building things is cool when they’re yours or your friends’. Kids are fun.
I feel like some guys tend to be wired to really enjoy the grind, but you have to get regular little indications towards progress, and kinda let yourself get ‘addicted’.
I’ve never gotten around to actually reading up on this, but I’ve always suspected it has to do with the frequency of gratification. In real life you could study for 8 hours and, while you’ll learn a lot, you don’t get that dopamine (or whatever) hit until you complete the test, succeed at the project, etc. Games, however, are constructed so that you get little rewards at regular intervals to keep you hooked, like levels, new gear, etc. Some, particularly a lot of mobile games, obviously prey on susceptible people with that loop, but even “regular” games can get pretty addictive with that sort of progression.
(I’m far from anti-gaming. It’s my main hobby. This is just my guess at how the psychology behind it works.)
This might be an interesting read: https://celiahodent.com/understanding-the-success-of-fortnite-ux/
I can grind for a month for 1 of 100 ingredients for a ring that allows me to do something i could already do, but more convenient, in a block game, but not study for a couple days
Why does this game sound oddly familiar edit: I’m guessing windcraft, rlcraft or Hypixel skyblock
I was referencing the minecraft modpack Another Quality Modpack 2(in a multiplayer server to be specific)
Just got back into The 1.7.10 pack, good times
Why do our brains hate us?
I mean, you keep bumping into stuff. Who do you think has to deal with those pain signals all the damn time?
Me
It’s grinding either way, but the real life stats can affect much more.
This meme brought to you by a young kid trying to study, am I on Reddit?
Nah, not necessarily. I’m 40 and meant to be doing prep study for the Cytech exam and I’ve watched a grand total of one tutorial video, but I’ve put in almost 100 hours on Euro Truck Sim 2.
I wish more effort was put in to gamifying education courses.
That has nothing to do with age. Most people nowadays are so used to instant gratification that they struggle with stuff that only helps them in the long term, me included. Last time I tried to seriously sit down and learn I caught myself doing dishes and watering plants after not even 30mins.
It’s good if there are younger kids like me or even younger. We need some content to consume babyyyyy.
