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On April 12 2014 02:22 Liquid`Nazgul wrote:
Seems to me that unrelated to physical capability you are always going to find a downward trend in speed related to age in esports when you do a research like this.
People are less motivated to play games intensively once they reach at a certain age. There's a few reasons for this. One: esports is incredibly tough mentally and most people just can't keep up the same level of intensity. Two: you need to start thinking about other options in life. Less motivation leads to lower APM.
There are also other possibilities to explain a speed discrepancy such as the youngsters of our scene growing up with trying to be fast. If in 2006 one kid of the age of 7 schools himself to have an high APM, and one guy who is 16 does the same, then, if all else is the same, in 2014 guaranteed the 15 year old will be faster than the 24 year old. Because gaming and esports are still new things the older you are the more likely it is you started at a later age.
Whether or not slowing down at these specific ages is related to physics I'm not convinced about.
Let me respond to a few of these points.
Point 1: Less motivation leads to less APM. - I completely agree with this as an explanation for why there are proportionally fewer high level players that are older. Gaining and maintaining a high level of skill require commitment and time, and when that wanes, so does performance. BUT, What we find is the same speed effect in every league Bronze 20s are faster than bronze 30s, Silver 20s are faster than Silver 30s, and on up. I have a hard time believing that speed differences within bronze and silver are due to motivation. I'm certainly motivated to win, as, I'm sure, is everyone who plays.
Point 2: 8 years of speed training will benefit a 7yr old more than a 16 yr old. Your argument is that there is a physiological "critical period" wherein an equivalent amount of training will benefit a younger person more than an older person. Perhaps. We certainly don't have the data to rule out this kind of effect. There is lots of expertise research, though, that seems to show that performance is a product of training time, and that, given equivalent training, you will see equivalent gains. The problem is that the 16yr old won't really spend the equivalent time to train (your point 1, perhaps), and so everything is not equal. Note though, that in our sample there are no differences in total SC2 experience among the different ages, and thus there is no reason to believe that older people aren't doing the same kind of training.
Point 3: These changes are not physiological changes. There are many studies of human physiology which show degradation of various kinds at this general time period, so there's not much disagreement about the possibility that these changes are biologically based. When we wrote the paper, we had to keep fighting with one reviewer who wanted us to speculate about the neurophysiological underpinnings of this effect. We were reluctant to do that because we don't have any biological data. So, I agree that we can't say for sure that these changes are biological degradation, but I don't think it's implausible that they are.
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On April 12 2014 02:44 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 02:05 Frex wrote:
Personally I am just turning 20 and every year I find starcraft less important. I have kept my passion, but as I have matured I have found my performance in video games be less relevant. I no longer find myself turning on my game mode after school and put my 110% focus on a video game. I don´t even know if I can get so hectic about a good game as I did a couple years back when I used to game past mid-night on almost every single weekend.
I like to think that the study neglects the fact that it is much easier to get serious about a game like Starcraft when you are in your late teens or early twenties than when you are getting close to thirty. Did you notice that they do not actually claim that skill level decreases, just that the speed is, so your objection completely misses.
You make a good point, however, for me personally focus equals higher APM. If I´m not as motivated to play it also shows in my speed since I don´t have the same drive to reach high APM.
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On April 12 2014 03:16 Frex wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 02:44 mcc wrote:On April 12 2014 02:05 Frex wrote:
Personally I am just turning 20 and every year I find starcraft less important. I have kept my passion, but as I have matured I have found my performance in video games be less relevant. I no longer find myself turning on my game mode after school and put my 110% focus on a video game. I don´t even know if I can get so hectic about a good game as I did a couple years back when I used to game past mid-night on almost every single weekend.
I like to think that the study neglects the fact that it is much easier to get serious about a game like Starcraft when you are in your late teens or early twenties than when you are getting close to thirty. Did you notice that they do not actually claim that skill level decreases, just that the speed is, so your objection completely misses. You make a good point, however, for me personally focus equals higher APM. If I´m not as motivated to play it also shows in my speed since I don´t have the same drive to reach high APM.
That objection seems to be mitigated by the fact that they actually observed this on all skill levels (leagues).
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On April 12 2014 02:30 ASoo wrote:Great work on this study, I enjoyed the read. I noticed that your introduction got a bit defensive when it came to SC2's legitimacy as an expertise task. Have you run up against much resistance among peer reviewers to using this dataset in the stuff you've published so far? Also... Show nested quote +the sample includes 3276 males and 29 females, so no generalizations here will be extended to the latter population lol
We are careful to make the arguments to establish it as legitimate expertise. I do this in talks as well. Mostly people are just surprised to find that eSports is a thing. It will change over time, as long as the eSports demographic opens up beyond the 16-24 male crowd.
We're candid about the sample, so we haven't had any trouble there. I was surprised at the degree of skew. Our sample was primarily from the TL and Reddit groups, so perhaps female SC2 players hang out someplace else.
One time I had a professor interested in studying mentoring programs for video game communities call me up. When she found out only 1% of the players were female she practically hung up on me, lol.
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On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 01:06 Chaplin wrote:
I didn't read the study but as long as human history keeps refuting data suggesting something like "too young / too old / unlikely / impossible", I don't need to ^^ This is such a mentally weak statement.
This is such a mentally weak statement.
On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:
To even suggest that the overwhelming body of common sense and the already established same aspects happening in other sports doesn't exist is akin to proclaiming the world is flat and not round.
Uh, wait! Let me quickly open http://www.dramabutton.com/.
The overwhelming body of common sense argued in the (I believe) 70's that runners won't surpass the 100m world record at that time. Suggesting that humans simply can't run faster. (We are now almost half a second faster.)
It was also believed and common sense that women had no shot in professional chess (deficit in the visual-spatial realm and all that good jazz). Then Judith Polgar became Grandmaster at a younger age than Bobby Fischer.
A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status.
There are a plethora of possible reasons why people in physical demanding sports don't last long (read: physically decline while still being relative young). One might be very well that people train in harmful ways.
I can imagine that this even multiplies when you start young.
I for one don't question an advancement in sports medicine. (Wikipedia says: "Athletic training has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA) as an allied health care profession since 1990." Seems not that long for a profession?)
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On April 11 2014 23:39 Kitaen wrote:
what most people (including this study) forget is that after years and years of progaming there are a lot of people who lose their passion.
it's because the years of playing pc games are much more intense compared to RL sports.
you don't practice soccer 10 hours a day and sleep with 10 teammates in a dormlike appartment with 25+ years
it is way harder to "live" pc games for more than a decade (considering you start at smth like 14-15 years of age) thus many pro gamers retire in their mid 20's and only the most passionate ones will do it longer professionally.
good point
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On April 12 2014 02:50 Azelja wrote:
Eh, not exactly sure how they come to the conclusion that skill declines with age just because a good portion of the older players are slower. Seems to me like they kinda just scratched the surface on the irl interferences like work, family etc. pp. and shrugged it off to a certain extent.
As long as even 40+ year old guitar players like Petrucci or Broderick (among a ton of others) can shred faces off, flying across 7-strings, playing 16th triplets at 200 bpm, while keeping track of the song, the rest of the band members and both the fretting and picking hand, I think I will be fine as long as I can spend quality time in games practicing.
Response time is the slowing they're talking about, not simple finger-speed. Looking-doing latency, as they call it, is not relevant to nearly the same degree in practiced musical contexts.
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On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:On April 12 2014 01:06 Chaplin wrote:
I didn't read the study but as long as human history keeps refuting data suggesting something like "too young / too old / unlikely / impossible", I don't need to ^^ This is such a mentally weak statement. This is such a mentally weak statement. Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:
To even suggest that the overwhelming body of common sense and the already established same aspects happening in other sports doesn't exist is akin to proclaiming the world is flat and not round.
Uh, wait! Let me quickly open http://www.dramabutton.com/. The overwhelming body of common sense argued in the (I believe) 70's that runners won't surpass the 100m world record at that time. Suggesting that humans simply can't run faster. (We are now almost half a second faster.) It was also believed and common sense that women had no shot in professional chess (deficit in the visual-spatial realm and all that good jazz). Then Judith Polgar became Grandmaster at a younger age than Bobby Fischer. A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. There are a plethora of possible reasons why people in physical demanding sports don't last long (read: physically decline while still being relative young). One might be very well that people train in harmful ways. I can imagine that this even multiplies when you start young. I for one don't question an advancement in sports medicine. (Wikipedia says: "Athletic training has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA) as an allied health care profession since 1990." Seems not that long for a profession?)
Says a guy who did not read the study and did not even properly read the abstract in the OP.
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On April 11 2014 23:39 Kitaen wrote:
what most people (including this study) forget is that after years and years of progaming there are a lot of people who lose their passion.
it's because the years of playing pc games are much more intense compared to RL sports.
you don't practice soccer 10 hours a day and sleep with 10 teammates in a dormlike appartment with 25+ years
it is way harder to "live" pc games for more than a decade (considering you start at smth like 14-15 years of age) thus many pro gamers retire in their mid 20's and only the most passionate ones will do it longer professionally.
What most responds to this thread are missing is that the study is across players of all leagues, so there's not really any progamer burn-out effect (which we can all see whenever legend xyz fails a come back or transition to SC2).
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On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:
A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status.
becoming the expert is never the problem, becoming better than most experts requires the extra talent.
there is a reason we don't have 10 messis, 10 federers or 10 gretzkys.
then again, talent is smth you cannot deny.
it's not a training regime that seperates young boys in school weather they are good or bad at sports, some simply have it some don't.
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On April 12 2014 05:14 Wuster wrote:Show nested quote +On April 11 2014 23:39 Kitaen wrote:
what most people (including this study) forget is that after years and years of progaming there are a lot of people who lose their passion.
it's because the years of playing pc games are much more intense compared to RL sports.
you don't practice soccer 10 hours a day and sleep with 10 teammates in a dormlike appartment with 25+ years
it is way harder to "live" pc games for more than a decade (considering you start at smth like 14-15 years of age) thus many pro gamers retire in their mid 20's and only the most passionate ones will do it longer professionally.
What most responds to this thread are missing is that the study is across players of all leagues, so there's not really any progamer burn-out effect (which we can all see whenever legend xyz fails a come back or transition to SC2).
well, as mentioned before, there are several reasons to slow down gaming hours in the mid 20's.
and btw, it was more of a theory than a backed up fact 
but then again i know that playing 10 to 12 hours a day while maintaining top level is incredible exhausting if you HAVE to do it. it's not the same if you play for fun 10 hours, take a day off, party on the weekends with friends, fuck your girl 3 days a week when she's in town etc.
if you play professionally for almost 10 years and only have average succes like most foreigners or b-teamers, ofc you will retire with 20 something when you still have all options to live a regular life.
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What if I'm 16 and have <100 apm? Am I just destined to suck forever?
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The problem with this study is:
The motor skills are refined at a very young age.
That means, if someone starts playing too late he won't compare well against players that started at a young age.
Therefore, to be meaningful, the study needs to compare players that started playing at the same age with each other.
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I'm just gonna say congrats on publishing in PLOS One and f*ck the haters in this thread (I'm just sad for you there's a typo in the abstract  )!
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On April 12 2014 04:11 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:On April 12 2014 01:06 Chaplin wrote:
I didn't read the study but as long as human history keeps refuting data suggesting something like "too young / too old / unlikely / impossible", I don't need to ^^ This is such a mentally weak statement. This is such a mentally weak statement. On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:
To even suggest that the overwhelming body of common sense and the already established same aspects happening in other sports doesn't exist is akin to proclaiming the world is flat and not round.
Uh, wait! Let me quickly open http://www.dramabutton.com/. The overwhelming body of common sense argued in the (I believe) 70's that runners won't surpass the 100m world record at that time. Suggesting that humans simply can't run faster. (We are now almost half a second faster.) It was also believed and common sense that women had no shot in professional chess (deficit in the visual-spatial realm and all that good jazz). Then Judith Polgar became Grandmaster at a younger age than Bobby Fischer. A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. There are a plethora of possible reasons why people in physical demanding sports don't last long (read: physically decline while still being relative young). One might be very well that people train in harmful ways. I can imagine that this even multiplies when you start young. I for one don't question an advancement in sports medicine. (Wikipedia says: "Athletic training has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA) as an allied health care profession since 1990." Seems not that long for a profession?) Says a guy who did not read the study and did not even properly read the abstract in the OP.
Says a guy who did not even say what the guy who says he did not read the study and therefor did not say anything about its specific content missed out or got wrong. But at least he had something to say.
"I have a voice!"
On April 12 2014 05:31 Kitaen wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:
A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. becoming the expert is never the problem, becoming better than most experts requires the extra talent. there is a reason we don't have 10 messis, 10 federers or 10 gretzkys. then again, talent is smth you cannot deny. it's not a training regime that seperates young boys in school weather they are good or bad at sports, some simply have it some don't.
So, we start off by putting yet another level on top of the one we call "expert" to justify "talent". Makes things too easy, in my opinion.
Of course there are reasons why some people are better than others. I would even say, there are many! Only the so called "talent" isn't one of them.
But I can understand that it's an easy way out: If you don't succeed, you simply lack talent and can therefor give up with a clear conscience. It's also very easy to just speak out one word as a commentator instead of giving a thorough analysis of what makes you outstanding in any given field.
But since you mentioned tennis and because I accidently read something about the Williams sisters this day: Their father decided that they would become tennis professionals. Quite like the Polgar sisters and coincidently both fathers got their wish and they raised extraordinary "talents" or "geniuses".
Funny how things go.
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On April 12 2014 06:58 Chaplin wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 04:11 mcc wrote:On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:On April 12 2014 01:06 Chaplin wrote:
I didn't read the study but as long as human history keeps refuting data suggesting something like "too young / too old / unlikely / impossible", I don't need to ^^ This is such a mentally weak statement. This is such a mentally weak statement. On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:
To even suggest that the overwhelming body of common sense and the already established same aspects happening in other sports doesn't exist is akin to proclaiming the world is flat and not round.
Uh, wait! Let me quickly open http://www.dramabutton.com/. The overwhelming body of common sense argued in the (I believe) 70's that runners won't surpass the 100m world record at that time. Suggesting that humans simply can't run faster. (We are now almost half a second faster.) It was also believed and common sense that women had no shot in professional chess (deficit in the visual-spatial realm and all that good jazz). Then Judith Polgar became Grandmaster at a younger age than Bobby Fischer. A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. There are a plethora of possible reasons why people in physical demanding sports don't last long (read: physically decline while still being relative young). One might be very well that people train in harmful ways. I can imagine that this even multiplies when you start young. I for one don't question an advancement in sports medicine. (Wikipedia says: "Athletic training has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA) as an allied health care profession since 1990." Seems not that long for a profession?) Says a guy who did not read the study and did not even properly read the abstract in the OP. Says a guy who did not even say what the guy who says he did not read the study and therefor did not say anything about its specific content missed out or got wrong. But at least he had something to say. "I have a voice!" Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 05:31 Kitaen wrote:On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:
A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. becoming the expert is never the problem, becoming better than most experts requires the extra talent. there is a reason we don't have 10 messis, 10 federers or 10 gretzkys. then again, talent is smth you cannot deny. it's not a training regime that seperates young boys in school weather they are good or bad at sports, some simply have it some don't. So, we start off by putting yet another level on top of the one we call "expert" to justify "talent". Makes things too easy, in my opinion. Of course there are reasons why some people are better than others. I would even say, there are many! Only the so called "talent" isn't one of them. But I can understand that it's an easy way out: If you don't succeed, you simply lack talent and can therefor give up with a clear conscience. It's also very easy to just speak out one word as a commentator instead of giving a thorough analysis of what makes you outstanding in any given field. But since you mentioned tennis and because I accidently read something about the Williams sisters this day: Their father decided that they would become tennis professionals. Quite like the Polgar sisters and coincidently both fathers got their wish and they raised extraordinary "talents" or "geniuses". Funny how things go.
The book outliers casts a ton of doubt on the innate talent aspect.
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On April 12 2014 03:24 Chaplin wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:On April 12 2014 01:06 Chaplin wrote:
I didn't read the study but as long as human history keeps refuting data suggesting something like "too young / too old / unlikely / impossible", I don't need to ^^ This is such a mentally weak statement. This is such a mentally weak statement. Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 01:24 Eliezar wrote:
To even suggest that the overwhelming body of common sense and the already established same aspects happening in other sports doesn't exist is akin to proclaiming the world is flat and not round.
Uh, wait! Let me quickly open http://www.dramabutton.com/. The overwhelming body of common sense argued in the (I believe) 70's that runners won't surpass the 100m world record at that time. Suggesting that humans simply can't run faster. (We are now almost half a second faster.) It was also believed and common sense that women had no shot in professional chess (deficit in the visual-spatial realm and all that good jazz). Then Judith Polgar became Grandmaster at a younger age than Bobby Fischer. A whole lot of people still think that you need talent in any given field to achieve expert status. There are a plethora of possible reasons why people in physical demanding sports don't last long (read: physically decline while still being relative young). One might be very well that people train in harmful ways. I can imagine that this even multiplies when you start young. I for one don't question an advancement in sports medicine. (Wikipedia says: "Athletic training has been recognized by the American Medical Association (AMA) as an allied health care profession since 1990." Seems not that long for a profession?)
I actually can't believe you are as intellectually challenged as you are pretending to be here, I mean its possible, but its more likely that you are wanting to argue for the sake of arguing and not realizing how completely off base you are being.
It is simply a fact that people in every way become weaker over time. Obviously you have the current hard ceiling of telomeres and how many times they can divide. You also have the plethora of studies that show that response time (not reaction time) is slower for humans the older they are and has been looked into with the safety of older drivers. If people's response time slows over time...then yes it happens to gamers too even if Artosis seems to often spout off information that seems to be totally ignorant of that fact.
So instead of engaging the study and the other studies that show the problem of slowing response times over age (here is one for you: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2586814/)
Your response is to talk about people thinking a record would never be broken for runners? This makes me believe you have to be trolling for several reasons.
1) What does "projections" which cannot be tested but only be theorized have to do with studying the decline the body goes through while aging? Nothing
2) What data about people not being able to continue to perform at peak level do you not believe? It happens in all professions whether mental or athletic. Studies have been done on chess players and how their ability to analyze slows as they get into their 30s. Studies have been done on how older drivers react as fast as younger drivers, but their physical response comes slower. Individuals have been documented as losing a step over time in all major sports leagues. How does people "believing" women couldn't be a grandmaster in chess relate in any way to studies that document that people degrade over time?
Literally, your entire post was basically spouting off random dumb stuff that has nothing to do with whether or not the human body decays over time in every way.
Your response is akin to me saying...people said you get fat on fast food, but Jared lost weight eating subway therefor StarCraft players won't slow down over time.
Again...I have a hard time believing you are actually as challenged as you are portraying yourself.
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Anyone TLDR this? I don't understand where LDR is being extracted from. Read the first 4 pages, skimmed the rest, and there seem to be too many outside variables. There are multiple factors which contribute to skill in sc2.
I think in order for any study in this genre to be successful, it needs to follow the same pro players. Professional players in the top .001% respond differently than the rest. Looks like this guy agrees with me.
On April 12 2014 01:01 nkr wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2014 00:26 InvictusRage wrote:On April 12 2014 00:11 nkr wrote:
I would rather read the statistics saying that players above the age of 24 are slightly slower, not that you get slower after the age of 24. There are other factors not taken into account that can give you the same result. This is serious scholarship, guys. Unless, having actually read the article, you can point to a particular factor that they didn't take into account, you shouldn't just assume that they didn't consider it and integrate it into the work. Let me repeat that: this is obviously serious scholarship, published in a peer-reviewed journal. There's a ton of generic "Oh, I dunno about that" in this thread by people who obviously haven't actually read the piece. This isn't some dude saying 'oh, you know, you can just tell that they're slower;' this is a rigorous statistical assessment of a substantial data set. If you're not going to read it, at least give it the credit that peer-review deserves. The statistics simply do not show that players get slower as they get older, because that's not what the gathered data means in my humble opinion. It shows that the older players are slower. There is a significant distinction to be made here, in my eyes.
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the study says something about 40 years old players ??
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EPT
