3-Minute Video Game Accurately Detects Depression

A simple, three-minute video game could soon help doctors diagnose clinical depression with remarkable accuracy. While video games are often seen as a form of leisure, researchers at New York University have discovered that the way people play a short, apple-collecting game reveals a critical marker of depression known as anhedonia,the inability to feel pleasure from normally enjoyable activities.

The game asks players to collect falling apples from trees. As a tree is harvested, it yields fewer apples per round, forcing players to decide when to move to a new tree to maintain a high score. In a study involving 120 volunteers, 50 of whom had major depression, the results were striking. Healthy participants switched trees when their current tree dropped to about four or five apples per round. Depressed participants switched much sooner, often when a tree was still yielding around eight apples. The speed of switching also correlated with the severity of the depression, meaning those with worse symptoms abandoned trees even more quickly.

The underlying science ties this behavior to a concept called the reference point, an unconscious benchmark of expectations. For most people, a surprise,like an unexpected ice cream treat,briefly resets expectations and then returns to normal, allowing joy from the next happy event. For those with depression, that benchmark can rise and get stuck, so even positive new experiences fail to lift their mood. The game captures this lack of response to novelty.

Senior study author Paul Glimcher, director of the Institute for Translational Neuroscience at NYU’s Grossman School of Medicine, envisions the game as a routine tool. “We ultimately see this as something that could be used as a thermometer or blood pressure cuff for depression,” he told Gizmodo. The goal is not just diagnosis but ongoing monitoring. Instead of requiring a patient to visit a doctor every few months, a quick smartphone game could track symptom changes weekly. “We could send you home with a prescription for this test. You would take it once a week, and we’d know whether a drug or therapy was helping you in two or three weeks,” Glimcher explained.

The research, published Wednesday in the journal PNAS, also included a second experiment where participants bid on favorite snacks. Healthy people temporarily lowered their bids after seeing a favorite snack, but quickly returned to normal. Depressed individuals continued to bid less, showing how their expectations become persistently distorted.

Lead author Aadith Vittala, an MD/Ph. D. student in Glimcher’s lab, notes that not every depressed person experiences anhedonia to the same degree. The game could help clinicians distinguish between different types of depression and tailor treatments more precisely. The team is now pursuing FDA clearance for the game as a Class II medical device, aiming to transform it from a research tool into a practical, accessible diagnostic aid.