Video games 'beneficial' for children Children who play video games for up to an hour a day are more sociable, happy and less hyperactive, The Telegraph and Daily Mail report after the publication of a study on the links between gaming and behaviour.
The study involved around 5,000 young people aged 10 to 15 who were asked to report their use of computer games, as well as complete a questionnaire assessing sociability, life satisfaction, and emotional and behavioural problems.
About 75% of the participants reported playing computer games every day. Compared with adolescents who didn't play computer games, those who played for less than one hour a day reported higher levels of social behaviour and life satisfaction, and lower levels of emotional and behavioural problems. There was no difference between non-players and those who played one to three hours a day.
Meanwhile, adolescents who played more than three hours a day were found to be less social, have lower life satisfaction, and more emotional and behavioural problems than non-players.
But the study has several limitations that the media reports failed to acknowledge. The contribution of game playing in explaining the differences in behaviour between non-players and light or heavy players was tiny – less than 1.5% – suggesting that other factors (including hereditary, environmental and lifestyle factors) are likely to be having a much greater influence.
Also, because the study examined both levels of game playing and behaviour at the same time, even if there is a link between the two, it's not able to tell us the direction of the relationship – whether gaming for less than an hour a day makes adolescents happy and sociable, or whether happy, sociable adolescents are more likely to engage in low levels of play rather than none or more.
Other limitations of this
cross-sectional study include only using self-report questionnaires, which may be open to the possibility of inaccuracies and biased reporting.
