Scientific American article about SC2+Science

In a paper published this year, cognitive scientist Joshua Lewis and colleagues at the University of California – San Diego analyzed what actions players took in 2000 games to see if certain capabilities stood out as hallmarks of success. Unlike previous studies, which tested participants before and after they played games to see if their behaviors changed, the approach taken by Lewis and colleagues allowed them to look for specific differences in what players are doing and perceiving.

They tracked several measures, including how many actions players took per minute and the distances between the locations where actions occurred across the map. Not surprisingly, they found that players who made the most moves tended to win. Of more interest was the second calculation. Distributing actions more widely across a map, which the authors argue reflects a player’s ability to distribute attention, also correlated highly with winning.

Now the question is whether people can learn to divide their attention more effectively. Professional Starcraft players belong to teams, with coaches and practice schedules, and they devote the majority of their time to developing their abilities. “If there is some methodology for building up multitasking skills, we might be able to figure out a way to train people to better distribute their attention,” Lewis says. “Maybe these teams have learned that implicitly.”