Serious (biofeedback) games offer promising ways to supplement or replace more expensive face-to-face interventions in health care. However, studies on the validity and effectiveness of EEG-based serious games remain scarce. In the current study, we investigated whether the conditions of the neurofeedback game “Daydream” indeed trained the brain activity as mentioned in the game manual. EEG activity was assessed in 14 healthy male volunteers while playing the 2 conditions of the game. The participants completed a training of 5 sessions. EEG frequency analyses were performed to verify the claims of the manual. We found significant differences in α- to β-ratio between the 2 conditions although only in the amplitude data, not in the power data. Within the conditions, mean α-amplitude only differed significantly from the β-amplitude in the concentration condition. Our analyses showed that neither α nor β brain activity differed significantly between game levels (higher level requiring increased brain activity) in either of the two conditions. In conclusion, we found only marginal evidence for the proposed claims stated in the manual of the game. Our research emphasizes that it is crucial to validate the claims that serious games make, especially before implementing them in the clinic or as therapeutic devices.

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作为潜在疗法的严肃游戏：神经反馈游戏的验证研究

严肃的（生物反馈）游戏提供了有希望的方法来补充或替代更昂贵的面对面的医疗干预措施。然而，关于基于脑电图的严肃游戏的有效性和有效性的研究仍然很少。在目前的研究中，我们调查了神经反馈游戏“白日梦”的条件是否确实像游戏手册中提到的那样训练了大脑活动。在玩游戏的 2 个条件时，对 14 名健康男性志愿者的脑电图活动进行了评估。参与者完成了 5 节课的培训。执行 EEG 频率分析以验证手册的声明。我们发现 2 种条件之间的 α 与 β 比率存在显着差异，尽管仅在幅度数据中，而不是在功率数据中。条件内，平均α-振幅仅在浓度条件下与β-振幅显着不同。我们的分析表明，在两种情况下，α 和 β 大脑活动在游戏级别（更高级别需要增加大脑活动）之间没有显着差异。总之，我们只发现了游戏手册中提出的主张的边缘证据。我们的研究强调，验证严肃游戏的声明至关重要，尤其是在将它们用于临床或作为治疗设备之前。