In the hopes of combating rising suicide and mental illness rates, the U.S. Army is implementing a mental stress training course for all 1.1 million members of the National Guard, reservists, and active-duty soldiers.
The training, the first of its kind in the military, is meant to improve performance in combat and head off the mental health problems, including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicide, that plague about one-fifth of troops returning from Afghanistan and Iraq [The New York Times]. The program will be taught by Army sergeants in classes that generally last about an hour-and-a-half, and will begin in October at two bases before spreading to all service members. The training will also be available for family members and civilian employees.
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Playing the absorbing video game Tetris immediately after a traumatic experience could reduce the most jarring symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the flashbacks in which the distressing memory invades the brain. In an odd new study, researchers showed volunteers ugly images of nasty accidents, crushed-up skulls and bloody entrails from various sources. Then they asked half of them to play Tetris. While the other half apparently did nothing…. The Tetris players apparently suffered significantly fewer nasty memories of those ugly images than did those who were left idle [CNET].
The Tetris players may have experienced fewer flashbacks because they were distracted during a crucial window of opportunity, the few hours after the traumatic incident when the brain is consolidating the memory. Says lead author Emily Holmes: “We wanted to find a way to dampen down flashbacks – the raw sensory images of trauma that are over-represented in the memories of those with PTSD. Tetris may work by competing for the brain’s resources for sensory information. We suggest it specifically interferes with the way sensory memories are laid down in the period after trauma and thus reduces the number of flashbacks that are experienced afterwards” [BBC News]. Playing Tetris could be considered a “cognitive vaccine” against flashbacks, Holmes suggested.
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