Jane McGonigal
Director of Games R&D, Institute for the Future. On 1 show, 2 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
authoracademicother@avantgame ↗LinkedIn ↗janemcgonigal.com ↗Wikipedia ↗YouTube ↗
She researches the psychological and cognitive benefits of video games, designing alternate reality games to build personal resilience and solve complex real-world challenges. She is the creator of the recovery platform SuperBetter and the author of acclaimed books including Reality Is Broken, SuperBetter, and Imaginable.
1shows
2appearances
32statements
13resolved
10supported
1contradicted
77%fully supported
Everything Jane McGonigal said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
McGonigal: Peer-game benefits should outweigh parental discomfort over on-screen violence
“If there's a game that all your kids, friends are playing, even if it looks a little bit like, Ooh, I don't know.
It's, is there some realistic violence or not?
The benefits they get from playing the same game as their peer group.
Should outweigh whatever y…”
Jane McGonigal: Gaming over 21 hours weekly negatively impacts mental health
“21 hours a week is, like, the tipping point where we do start to see it can get in the way of physical health or mental health.”
Jane McGonigal: Kids retain study material better by gaming before studying
“If you want kids to retain what they study better, you should have them play video games first, and then do their homework, and then study before they go to sleep, because if you study first, and then as your reward, you get to play games, When you go to sleep…”
McGonigal: 21 Hours Weekly Is the Threshold Where Gaming Harms Health
“By the way, 21 hours a week is like the tipping point where we do start to see it can get in the way of physical health or mental health.”
McGonigal: Traditional Schooling Damaged Children's Mental Well-Being and Motivation
“We've done long-term damage to kids' mental wellbeing and their, you know, brain's ability to, I don't know, generate self-motivate, you know, outside of these external pressures.”
McGonigal: Humans will broadcast subconscious thoughts and feelings within 10 years
“I think it's fair to say in like 10 years, we're all going to be broadcasting subconscious or like pre-conscious thoughts and feelings in ways that we can't do it today.”
Jane McGonigal: US President Has Legal Power to Shut Down Internet and Mobile Service
“Our president has the power, according to the war War Powers Act. He can shut down internet, can shut down TV and radio, can shut down mobile service.”
McGonigal: People Must Trust Expert Systems Rather Than Rely On Intuition
“We probably shouldn't think for ourselves is, is part of the problem. I mean, we do, we need to have trust. There needs to be trust in some expert or external system. I mean, if you're always just sort of trusting what you think, your brain is going to get you…”
McGonigal: Playing Tetris before bed suppresses traumatic flashbacks and nightmares
“Playing a game right before bed will essentially hijack the attention center, and especially the visual centers if it's a game that's very visual. I mean, Tetris is like the golden game in clinical trials when they study this effect. It's like Tetris is The be…”
McGonigal: Concussions cause depression as a protective mechanism against re-injury
“Cause I mean, I can tell you the one big breakthrough that we now know is that concussions make you incredibly depressed cause your brain is trying to stop you from getting injured again. And so it kind of shuts down all the pathways that Tell your brain it's …”
McGonigal: Taking three steps disrupts the brain's inflammation process
“Stand up and take three steps. And no matter how you're feeling because that gets the blood flowing and it automatically disrupts the inflammation process.”
McGonigal: Every video game builds transferable adaptability and growth mindset
“The number one thing we know, any game that you love, I don't care if it's League of Legends, it's Fortnite, it's Candy Crush, whatever, whatever you feel drawn to we know that there is a transferable benefit, which is you get better at learning new things. At…”
McGonigal: Children Retain Information Better By Gaming Before Studying, Not After
“If you want kids to retain what they study better, you should have them play video games first, and then do their homework, and then study before they go to sleep, because if you study first, and then as your reward, you get to play games, When you go to sleep…”
McGonigal: Playing Tetris before sleep reduces trauma flashbacks and rumination
“Playing a game right before bed will essentially hijack the attention center and especially the visual centers. If it's a game, that's very visual. I mean, Tetris is like the golden game and in clinical trials, when they studied this effect, it's like Tetris i…”
McGonigal: Future of work will resemble Fortnite more than traditional offices
“You know, we've every reason to think that the future of work will be, you know, more like Fortnite than the kind of office jobs that we have today.”
McGonigal: Violent crime declined while video game playtime skyrocketed
“Video games, the number of people and the hours that we've spent playing them has skyrocketed, and yet violent crime has gone down almost on the same curve, and so it's just, it's like completely ludicrous, and nobody actually believes it increases violence.”
McGonigal: My 2008 and 2010 Games Forecast the 2019 Respiratory Pandemic
“Two of my biggest games, one in 2008, and one in 2010, forecast big respiratory pandemics that started in China for the year 2019 and 2020”
McGonigal: Combating Misinformation Requires Triggering Emotions Around Facts, Not Pure Reason
“We need to play on people's emotions more because that's how conspiracy theories work. It's how propaganda works. It's all based on emotion. So we can't just talk, you can't just reason your way out of that. You just have to, you have to trigger the emotions a…”
McGonigal: Corporate Gamification Manipulates Users Against Their Own Interests
“When we talk about gamification, usually what we're talking about are people who are, you know, Being, being motivated to do something they don't want to do. Whether it's like work, work harder, buy more stuff, pay longer attention, or engage more in something…”
McGonigal: Co-op gaming with the same people increases everyday social support
“We know that people who spend a lot of time playing the same game with the same people report getting more social support in their everyday lives.”
McGonigal: SuperBetter Has Helped Over One Million People Recover from Trauma
“And that was the genesis of A game super better that I played for my own healing and that has now helped more than a million people recover from symptoms of traumatic brain injury, depression, anxiety chronic pain, and other sort of challenges that we may stru…”
McGonigal: Lying in bed is bad for concussion recovery; patients need graded activity
“If you just lie in bed all day, it's actually not good for recovery. You do have to get out of bed. You have to Kind of work up to a threshold that's, like, 10% below it triggers your symptoms and keep pushing that.”
McGonigal: Concussions functionally impair future imagination and dopamine activation
“So there's actually a functional loss in your ability to imagine the future. And then when you do imagine the future, even if you're thinking about things that normally you get, would get you excited, your brain is basically refusing to fire up The pathways th…”
McGonigal: Articulating In-Game Skill Development Unlocks Real-World Transfer
“People who can talk about that, they tend to bring those skills to their work, to their learning, to their relationships, to their hobbies and all you have to do to get somebody to transfer the benefits of games to real life is just have that conversation, and…”
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Jane's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 KNOWLEDGE PROJECTLEDGER | Director of Games R&D, Institute for the Future | 2 | 32 | 77% 10/13 | full record on the Knowledge Project → |