Thursday, April 17th, 2008...7:03 pm - Gary Hayes
If you dont play video simulations, your at risk
Very interesting research from Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl Olson who have just researched for ($1.5Mill US) and written a book called “Grand Theft Childhood” which makes the claim that rather than video simulations (games for the oldie readers) being about social rejects the actual opposite is true. Those children who are not exposed to playing simulations with their parents or being involved with a more diverse range of people (facilitated by social networks - which online games are a big part) are likely to be outsiders in our ‘highly connected’ society - in other words they are ‘not normal’ and at risk. Also being interviewed in the future for a job, having a negative attitude or not having played games may be a disadvantage. Is this some kind of tipping point? OK it’s not rocket science saying “doing too much or too little of what your peers are doing is not good for you” but this may put an end to the endless nay sayers who blame the ills of society on large swathes of the population ‘playing’.
The video below is a short TV interview with the authors looks specifically at those that are at risk in real life (socially deviant) related to real life games - two key segments those who play for more than 15 hours per week and the surprising one, those who don’t play at all. Some good comments about this video and the book here.
Leave a Reply