Study Finds Too Much Gaming Is, and Is Not, Bad For Kids

[Flour]

I've been gaming since I was between 6 and 8 years old(21 now, can't really remember exact age I started), most of my free time was spent playing games(hours every day). I just read two 300~ page books in six days(slow for me) and I probably know to write/speak English better than those who have English as their first language.

It's not just games though, cartoons were also a huge help. But some idiots decided that games should have a Dutch language option(often standard or unchangeable) and cartoons should be in Dutch. It's also fairly easy to see when this change happened because almost nobody under the age of 16 is able to properly speak or write in English.

 

[StarStruckStrumpets]

I played games more THEN than I do now! I used to sit at home playing Kingdom Hearts or FFX until about 10pm, then go to sleep, then go to school, then repeat the cycle.

Now I'm in highschool, getting straight A's in every single piece of coursework I do. Then again, the majority obviously prove more than one spike in the results.

 

[Koganesaga]

That seems more or less true but even if I didn't have video games I doubt I'd study. So at least they don't have negative impact on [i/]me[/i].

That's probably the relation between gaming and low scores right there. Other than that, it doesn't make a lot of sense to relate the two unless the kid plays nothing but action games and hasn't even heard of Bioware.

 

[Tonimata]

Yup, again, common sense is the least common of senses altogether

 

[Meggiepants]

Although this is an interesting study, I think the study done by the folks who did Got Game: How the Gaming Generation is Changing Business Forever is much more provocative. To start with, they studied gamers who have been gaming for much longer than a few months. Some of their conclusions are very interesting.The book used to be called, The Kids are Alright, and here is a link to some of the information in that book.
http://www.nslg.net/gotgamebook/research.html
In any case, I'm not too worried about gaming degrading my mind.

 

[SwimmingRock]

It doesn't specify what games they were given, though. I actually advanced in reading and writing as a child because I started playing text-heavy JRPGs at age 6. This seems pretty much dependent on the type of game rather than saying anything about gaming as a whole.

 

[ShadowsofHope]

"Significantly lower reading/writing skills than non-gamers?"

They must have excluded Bioware, then, clearly.

 

[Bourne Endeavor]

Worthless study this amounted to. I learned the vast majority of my writing comprehension from roleplaying games and in addition to an improved vocabulary derived both from video games and anime. Nonetheless I suppose this is a step above the endless spewing video games are a blight to children everywhere.

 

[Saul B]

That's because they are not learning, but playing games... Too much of ANYTHING is bad, but nearly everything is good in moderation.

 

[Milney]

Whilst a scientific study showing the ludite population that gaming isn't really melting children's brains is always a boon to having gaming finally accepted as a mainstream media... medium I guess... it's rather depressing that it required a "scientifc" paper to show this.

What's that? People who study less do worse in school [on average]? Really? And you spent how much time/money/effort finding this out?

Well done! You've proven that people can't do two things at once which both require thier full attention, without the neglected activity suffering. I'd never have guessed to be honest as there is clearly no logicial link between this cause and effect.

 

[ghstman]

Yeah, it's common sense that too much of anything instead of studying will retard your development, but when you think about it, it does help to have the study. At least now instead of citing common sense to support why kids are getting dumber, we can have a scientific study to back it up, as compared to some politicians who might be convinced that video games emit stupid-rays from the tv screen, actively making your kids dumber.

What I'd really like to see though is a study to compare the effects of different types of games. Maybe repeat the study, but give one group of kids Mario Kart and another group of kids an RPG with a lot of text. One would think that all the cut-scene text reading might make up for the less book reading they are doing. Personally, I blame reading books as the reason I did poorly in middle school Spanish class. It's kind of hard to pay attention to the teacher when you're reading Michael Crichton under the desk.

Also, I'd like to see a study of the effects of Tetris on problem solving ability. To this day, I am a master at packing the car before going on vacation, and I blame Tetris for what I could almost call a super power.

 

[Bobular]

It doesn't specify what games they were given, though. I actually advanced in reading and writing as a child because I started playing text-heavy JRPGs at age 6. This seems pretty much dependent on the type of game rather than saying anything about gaming as a whole.

I was going to say something similar; my reading has been above average for as long as I can remember, much better than almost everyone I knew. I believe this is due to having to read to play older games (Baldur's Gate being the one that comes to mind). I know people who don't like older games purely because there is reading in them.

Kids should be educated by making them play Baldur's Gate.

 

[Little Duck]

That seems right. I kept up with my studies and read every night as a kid (Roald Dahl, Eoin Colfer, J.k. (at least I'm honest) until I turned 13, decided I loved Clarkson and bought all his hilarious books and learned to swear more coherently) but spent large quantities of gaming. But the way my rentals limited the game was I only got 2 or 3 games a year. Whilst I got alot more immersed and played the game for much longer periods of time (I spent around 4 years playing single player goldeneye) I also played on average less so I learnt more.

 

[geldonyetich]

Betcha their reading and writing skills would have improved if they were PC gamers who played games that required they type.

Apparently their most "hardcore" gamers were playing only 40 minutes a day and spent 18 minutes studying. Which leads to wonder want they did with the other 23 and 1/30th hours of the day.

Here's a thought: next time you do a study on gamers, how about using actual gamers instead of these barely gamer-curious kids?

 

[dstryfe]

Personally, I think that my reading and writing skills are far better than those of nearly everyone I come across these days. My attention span is fine, and my math skills are excellent...and all this happened *without* any kind of study. (I am in school...sometimes, but I don't study.)

 

[Abedeus]

Bullhonkey. I've been playing games for the last 12 out of 17 years and I buy at least one new book a month. And read several in-between. That's more than few of my colleagues put together.

 

[Banana Phone Man]

Hmmm. I played a lot more than that at that age but my reading and writing skills weren't bad and were not getting worse. However I did watch Countdown as a kid. It probably help equal it out. Perhaps what kids should do is if they play more games then they should study more. No harm done.

 

[DownOnTheUpside]

So basically this is saying if kids learn to discipline themselves between study time and play time then they'll be fine?

Damn I could have told them that without a study.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

Errm...I've been playing games my whole life and I'm one of the best readers I know. I was always about two grade levels ahead of the rest of my class, it was the only thing in school I was truly good at. As for writing, all I can say is that my handwriting is near illegible for a lot of people. But I use proper spelling and punctuation here on da internetz.