Survey Tackles College Gaming Stereotypes

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to an AP/Yahoo story discussing a survey on college gaming, whose results seem to challenge stereotypes about videogames interfering with college studies. According to a researcher for the project, which surveyed college gamers throughout the US, "It's not taking the place of studying; nor is it taking away from other activities. What.. [college students] seem to have done is incorporated gaming into a very multitask-oriented lifestyle." In fact, playing games can even save you time, quips college gamer David McNulty, "It takes less time to play a few games than to go downtown or see a movie with your friends. It's easier to meet them online and shoot at them."

Comments

Re:Not completely true

[DjReagan]

If you think that most people play 6 hours of computer games each day, then you have a very odd view of the world.

Re:Not completely true

[Babbster]

Or maybe they simply polled people who play games. There are a lot of people who don't consider videogaming their primary hobby but still enjoy playing. These people are usually referred to as "casual gamers." This term I've found is most often used by the "hardcore gamers" who use it derisively because they feel that the existence of casual gamers means that they get fewer 70-hour RPGs and insanely difficult shooters. I suspect that the "casual" gamers outnumber the "hardcore" gamers if only because games like The Sims and Madden dominate the sales charts year after year.

Me, I like the idea of more and more people playing video games casually. More of them buying video games pumps more money into the industry as a whole, which causes more games to be released. This means that software developers can keep people like me (who play as many as 8-10 hours a day) occupied...not to mention more high-tech employment so that Slashdot participants can keep up their workday posting habits. :)

Re:Not completely true

[Guppy06]

"if you play 6 hours a day, and you go out regulary and do stuff, there isnt much room for studies anymore, or is there?"

You're assuming that those six hours would have otherwise been spent studying.

saving time

[redune45]

Although I'm sure that gaming has helped me relax many times, there have been far too many times when I should have been studying, but just got stuck in the "just...one...more...level" endless loop.

Re:Not completely true

[PainKilleR-CE]

The study surveyed college students in general, finding that 2/3rds of them play games, and then gave additional data on the ones that do play games. If you play 6 hours a day, you definitely are not in the majority anyway (though averaging in some of my weekends I could easily be in the 6+ hours a day group). My experience in college was that it was perfectly possible to balance even an average of 6+ hours of gaming a day and still get all of my work done, but it was much harder to do so when I started working full time. Many times gaming is just a 10-30 minute break from studying, while other times it was more like 10 of us drinking and playing tournament-mode KI on the SNES on a Saturday evening.

In answer to your question, they polled people who play 6+ hours a day, people who play 1 hour a day, people who play 1 hour a week, and people who don't play at all. The article states that while half of gamers (people that play games at all) felt that it detracted from their study time (this sounds about right, most of the people I know in college think that gaming cuts into their studies), the reality (as opposed to their perception) was that their study habits really didn't vary from the habits of those that didn't play games. In other words, the people that don't play games have plenty of distractions from their studies as well, or those that play games probably are the types that would study a lot more than they really need to ;)

As someone else said, casual gaming is good for the industry. Not only does it pump money into it, but it also breeds more acceptance of it. Also, with the number of people that grew up with the Atari 2600 and now the NES, it's likely that we'll see more and more casual and hardcore gamers coming up, because more and more people started gaming at an early age and learned to balance gaming in their schedule as they saw fit.

Re:Not completely true

[pascalb3]

I'm not sure what the age demographic is here for Slashdot posters, but when I read news articles about this (as well as posts) I can definitely see a huge generation gap. This study was completely suprised about all of the conclusions it came to, yet I was not suprised at all. As a recent college graduate, this atmosphere is what I've been experiencing for four years; people playing games in class, studying, getting work done, IMing, emailing, sports, all of these activities coexist in a contemporary college environment. This comes as no suprise to those between 16 and 26. Not as though older people are ignorant of this fact, they just consistently misunderstand current culture.

My generation is one of multitaskers and speed-demons. Everyone I knew at college did not just sitdown and write a paper, most would also have the TV on, play MP3s, actively IM, and perhaps have a game of Freecell going. It's not that these students magically have more time in their days to play games, sleep, and study, it's that most of the time they do activities simultaneously.