Virtual Reality Games and Health

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytX5r__jzdw

This YouTube clip shows a scene from Criminal Minds that got me thinking when I saw it last night...
The quote that particularly interested me was at the very end of the clip
Reid says: "Did you know that stroke victims who play virtual reality games show significant advances in recovery than those who don't?


Now, I'm unsure exactly what research he was citing there. Most of the things Reid says in the show are based on facts though, so I decided to go to my trusty friend Google to find out more!


http://www.ti.rutgers.edu/publications/papers/2001_ieee_tnsre.pdf
This article that I found on Google Scholar showed promising results in three stroke patients using a virtual reality system which backs up what Reid was saying in Criminal Minds.

I'm just wondering how many different ways virtual reality games can be used to help people. Clearly it can help with actual physical ailments such as stroke. What behavioral problems could it help? Today, in class we talked about how smokers who virtually crushed a pack of cigarettes showed more motivation to quit smoking than those who didn't have the image of crushing a pack of cigarettes. We also talked about how therapy in virtual worlds could lead to more disclosure because the patients feel more comfortable in that anonymous environment rather than in a tiny office talking to a stranger.

Clearly there are many ways that virtual reality can be used to help people. I think this is an extremely interesting topic that deserves much more research. I feel like the opportunities here are endless.

Another interesting point is that playing video games can lead to increases of dopamine in the brain. Dopamine has affects on many things such as pain processing. It's also involved in behavioral disorders such as ADHD. I'm just wondering if we could use that knowledge to manipulate things in behavioral studies. Dopamine can often function as a type of reinforcement, so it could be interesting to see how this natural reinforcement in the brain (stemming from video games) can affect behavior.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dopamine

This topic of video games and health has always been interesting to me because my grandmother died of a brain tumor a few years ago. She was always playing World of Warcraft and seemed to be doing best when she was at the computer. At the time, we didn't know that she had a brain tumor so we didn't understand why she would feel sick and have a headache at work and then come home and be able to be perfectly fine playing her game. I'm wondering if dopamine or other things from the game caused reactions in her brain that led to less pain and dampened the symptoms of the tumor. Once she was unable to play the game anymore she deteriorated very rapidly. This obviously could just be because of the type of brain tumor she had, but I've always wondered if there were other factors at play and if this knowledge could be used to help people.

Those are just some ideas that I thought of on this topic. What do you guys think? What other ways can playing video games be used to change behavior? What other functions could be responsible for these changes (besides dopamine)?