Slashdot Mirror
Average Gamer Is 35, Fat and Bummed
kamapuaa writes "According to a study published in the upcoming October issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, the average US video game player is 35 years old, overweight, and tends toward depression. Specifically, female video game players tended towards depression, while males tended towards large BMIs. While the study itself points to several conclusions, one researcher noted: '... habitual use of video games as a coping response may provide a genesis for obsessive-compulsive video-game playing, if not video-game addiction.'"
On the flip side, the Washington Post is running a story about the mental health benefits of playing video games.
So you have all those things as a way to pass the time, but you don't see why you might be depressed or lonely. What's the idea of passing the time, are you waiting to die?
"... no, 500 is not a large enough sample size to draw MEANINGFUL correlations."
Your statement is mathematically incorrect. Also, the way you misuse 'meaningful' suggests that you know nothing about probability and statistical inferences. Any 101-level, intro stats class at virtually any college will teach sample size calcuation in the first month or two. Honestly--it's so easy, they make Poli Sci majors take it.
"MEANINGFUL": How big is a "big enough" sample to be able to extrapolate to the larger population? It's a pretty straightforward math question, and it's been settled by proof for well over a century. The answer depends on three things:
1) Higher levels of confidence require larger samples.
2) Extremely small category sizes (e.g., 5% depression incidence) require larger sample sizes.
3) Larger population sizes require larger samples.
#3 is the real bitch to understand, for most people. (WATCH CLOSELY HERE!) It's true that you need a larger sample to extrapolate to a larger population (all else being equal), BUT it's not a *directly* proportional relationship--the required sample size is proportional to a root of the population size. As in, if you double the population size, you DO NOT need double the sample size--you might only need to increase it slightly, by 1/10th or 1/100th.
Do you understand, yet? We're reaching the limits of what I can teach you, in this forum, so I would encourage you to take this up in a school setting and maybe learn a little more. But you know, I don't even think we've uncovered the real issue, yet.
I'm guessing that the study's results make you feel uncomfortable about yourself (this is Slashdot, after all). Is that what makes you get defensive and hostile, because you want to deny the study's implied judgement that YOU are fat, depressed, and such, because you're a gamer?
Sorry, man--if you're fat and sad, I feel bad for you, because I know that you didn't choose to be either of those things. It doesn't seem fair. But the fact is, life ain't fair, and denying it won't make you skinny or happy.