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Positive Link Between Video Games and Academic Performance, Study Suggests (theguardian.com)
Here's another report reaffirming that playing online video games doesn't necessarily hinder one with their grades. According to an analysis of data from over 12,000 high school students in Australia, children who play online video games tend to do better in academic science, maths and reading tests. The study says kids who played online games almost every day scored 15 points above average in maths and reading tests and 17 points above average in science. "The analysis shows that those students who play online video games obtain higher scores on Pisa (Program for International Student Assessment -- internationally recognized tests that are administered by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)) tests, all other things being equal," said Alberto Posso, from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology whp analyzed the data. "When you play online games you're solving puzzles to move to the next level and that involves using some of the general knowledge and skills in maths, reading and science that you've been taught during the day." The Guardian reports: The cause of the association between game playing and academic success is not clear from the research. It is possible that children who are gifted at maths, science and reading are more likely to play online games. Alternatively, it could be that more proficient students work more efficiently, and therefore have more free time, making online gaming a marker of possible academic ability rather than something that actively boosts performance. Posso also looked at the correlation between social media use and Pisa scores. He concluded that users of sites such as Facebook and Twitter were more likely to score 4% lower on average, and the more frequent the social networking usage, the bigger the difference. 78% of the teenagers said they used social networks every day. Other studies have found a link between heavy users of social networking and a low attention span, which is also linked to poorer academic performance, but the evidence is less than conclusive.
Does the fact that the games are online make a difference? Was this something that they controlled for at all? Do people who play single-player games not see the same benefit? If not, then their conclusion that it's related to puzzle-solving practice seems misplaced. If so, then why is the article focusing on online game playing?
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Another likely explanation is the parents' income level. Poor students tend not to be able to afford online gaming and also do less well in school.
... which I yelled from my dimly lit basement bedroom in their house that I've been living at for 35 years.
"It is possible that children who are gifted at maths, science and reading are more likely to play online games."
I'd say this is the mostly likely truth here.
Please notice that this does not mean to stop studying and play video games !!!
..but no sign of causality, as indicated in TFS. Perhaps it comes down to access to a computer, which could be an indicator of other learning opportunities?
People that play computer games tend to be:
1) Computer literate = average or greater intelligence and having the skills to self-teach technological skills.
2) Not dirt poor = having the many advantages of the middle class life.
3) Not have parents that are tyrannical puritans that discourage kids from learning.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
While I’m sure that playing problem-solving games hones problem solving skills, just making your kids play games isn’t going to make them math geniuses. In fact, for most kids, it would probably just make them waste time. Rather, it is an instinctive interest in puzzles that makes some people interested in games *and* STEM subjects.
And this link is going to just be statistical. I do computer engineering, and I have side interests in math, physics, linguistics, etc. But I really don’t like most video games. My wife has degrees in english, history, and law, and she kicks my butt at every game we play.
Right out of the box TFA points out a "link," not a causation. So we are left to ponder whether video games help kids achieve in the classroom, or whether smart kids tend to like video games.
Now I can conveniently ignore any other research!
Too few words not enough things in this world of things. The Scope of this article is too thin. It needs to delve into Single player Offline Game, and as many point out there is an Income gap and geography that comes into play. I work at a University and the most surprising thing to me in the places our students come from where only 30% of citizens have access to Internet due to the cost. ((Using Ghana as a Reference Country)) *Show of hands who was a 90s kid and got put on ADHD Medication as an excuse for my video game addiction and A's on math tests* I know my hand is up. Article Quote: "The cause of the association between game playing and academic success is not clear from the research. It is possible that children who are gifted at maths, science and reading are more likely to play online games. Alternatively, it could be that more proficient students work more efficiently, and therefore have more free time, making online gaming a marker of possible academic ability rather than something that actively boosts performance." As a middle class individual growing up at a time when I could see this article have a few words replaced with designer ADHD Medication I remember blazing through math because it was stupid easy and turning to video games and other activities because there was nothing to do in the 90s. We didn't have fancy smartphones and 1000s of Apps or Social Media. We had channel 16, Pre-Drug Drop dead Gorgeous Lindsey Lohan, SNES, N64 and Books...We didn't have the choices of the youth of today, nor the access to technology of 2016. Sorry got off on a tangent there. This article to me, though lacking on words and research depth, does resonate on some level because Practice makes Perfect. Online gaming when done in a productive setting teaches the basics of teamwork, problem solving, negotiation, all coupled together with the drive to accomplish something. I'm not too good with words sometimes, but if you practice something for 8 hours a day, you're going to be much more proficient than someone who only does it for an hour, in most cases (there are prodigies everywhere - just watched Masterchef Junior) I've been stuck at one point in a game trying over and over to get past it and after hours you pass it via trial and error, luck, determination, cursing, and caffeine. You succeed. I think we've all been there. (Zelda - Water Temple) I think for me at least my gaming experiences have assisted in preparing my mind for higher learning in Math, Science, and Reading.
It's only a correlation... if there is a causative link, it could very conceivably be in the reverse direction to the one you might be hoping for.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
stop the college for all push & have more vo-tech you know like Germany. Germany has good workers rights and Germany has a lower percentage of students go on to college (that is a good thing as they are learning real skills and not years of filler and fluff at a high cost.
That might work, but I was talking more about elementary through high school. In the US, we all but assume that everyone will be educated through high school level. In other countries, depending on where you live or what your "station" in life is, you might not even get elementary school education. You might go right into a vocational training school or might not get schooling at all. Likewise if you have some kind of disability that impairs your learning. So other countries can make sure that the tests scores are high by excluding all those folks while our scores are "dragged down" by them. Then again, our overall test scores might go but our populace as a whole has a better chance to get some rudimentary education than if we just wrote off whole groups of people and didn't even school them up to high school.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
Also the teach the test idea needs to go away.
https://www.washingtonpost.com...
I know plenty of smart people who failed out of college due to World of Warcraft. Some of them dropped the game and eventually got their degrees. Academic performance isn't strongly tied to intelligence, but to whether you show up to class and do the work.
Kids play games because they enjoy them; games involve abstract problem solving in various guises; kids thus learn to enjoy abstract problem solving, and practice it more. This then spills over into academic disciplines which harness similar skills as those the games reward. This is hardly new: chess was invented to teach strategy, as was go. People who play strategy games and enjoy them are most likely better than those who don't, all else being equal.
If you are motivated only by the avoidance of exam failure, or of getting told off by your teacher, you are learning reluctantly, and this is never a good route to mastery, since as soon as the source of fear (the exam or the pushy teacher) is removed, your motivation to practice and learn goes with it. If, however, you are driven by enjoyment, then so long as this enjoyment remains, so will your drive.
Is this so difficult to grasp?
John_Chalisque
I wonder how much of this research is being influenced by Eve Online, and it's insanely huge and complex market.
They probably get lower grades in gym class, though.
In 10 years the dude from High School who had the lettersman jacket will be selling used cars, of course.
"Academic performance" is only paying attention to that part of the body of knowledge that will appear on the tests on Fridays and the Final.
Being a good little pupil is what it's about. Lord help anybody attending the lecture who is actually interested and asks the professor a question about the subject that won't be on the test.
what about when the people can't pay there loans and just default?
It's nice to know that academic success causes video games. There is supporting evidence. Square Enix, EA, Rockstar and other video game makers did not exist until after universities were invented.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
W.T.F.???? It is Math people. It is not plural. Sciences sure but not Maths. Maybe the OP should play more video games. Oh, and the reason there is a strong correlation is because it isn't the game that is "making" the kids smarter. It is that the smarter kids are house bound nerds who never go out and party with their friends. They are introverts and have no other social options other than on-line gaming.
You need to travel a bit more. There is a place in this world where English was created, rather than imported and they contract mathematics to maths.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
I'd say if they don't know the difference between "their" and "there" then they should sue the college for giving them passing grades.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
I don't think you can default on student loans. I'm pretty sure that in the US even bankruptcy can't free you from student loan debt.
Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
Not always. Sometimes academic performance is tied to your ability not only to remember the necessary elements that you had read and heard, but the ability to learn how to make intuitive deductions from information that may be wholly new and different from anything that you did in class or may have read if you only read what the prof had instructed. I would argue that the best professors are the ones that challenge their students in that way, because the ones that can pass exams that are so structured have shown that they have more than just a capacity to incidentally remember what they have been taught, but also that they have actually *learned* it. I had one prof like this who taught several different sections in comp sci where I went, and I think there were actually only 2 semesters where I didn't have a class with him. He was easily the toughest prof in the entire faculty where I went to get a decent grade with, but he was also probably the best darn teacher that I ever had.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
We've been refusing the tests for our kids for years. It doesn't eliminate "teach to the test" but if enough parents do it, the test results will be useless* and over-testing might be backed away from.
* Arguably, the tests are already useless but the proponents of the tests insist they need this data and insist that testing kids more and more is the only way to collect this data. John Oliver covered it better than I ever could in a single comment.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
"Academic performance" is only paying attention to that part of the body of knowledge that will appear on the tests on Fridays and the Final.
Most of the professors I know are, or at least started out, genuinely interested in seeing student absorb new information and gain new skills. An incessant barrage of "Will this be on the test?" and "What should I know for the test?" type questions gets them trained pretty quickly to cater to those students who only care about the test. Other students hear mostly questions related to what's going to be on the test. It all sets up a horribly pathological positive feedback loop where once-enthusiastic teachers come to believe that students only care about the test, so they pre-emptively answer questions about test content, giving the rest of the students the impression that the tests are the only thing that matters.
Never mind the headaches associated with trying to give a 'participation' grade to reward those students who actually are interested, ask good questions, and do work that's not reflected in the tests. Or the tears when a test question is not exactly like one of the practice problems.
There are relatively few online games which involve "solving puzzles to move to the next level". I can think of a handful; Portal 2, for instance.
and the huge mass of MMORPGs and the like.
They require some reading skill (gotta see if there's something of interest in all those dialogs. Like some quest clue, etc.)
They require also some basic math (quickly making estimations about all the characters' stats everywhere).
Okay, it's REALLY not as complex as the puzzle solving you're thinking about, but it's enough to encourage a bit of reading and writing, and that is the markers in PISA that are reported in the summary.
So according to that interpretation, as long as the kid doesn't have some problems/pathology that turn them into MMORPG addicts, playing MMORPG would give them opportunity the exercise a bit their reading and basic math, hence the higher score.
Of course, as the summary points out, it could pretty well the opposite: kids which are better achiever and quicker learner finish their homework earlier and get more playtime.
And of course, it could be something completely different :
the set of intellectual abilities that make them good at school, happen to be also a good set of skill to find exploits and way to game the system as much as possible, hence more time also spent trying to find a good winning strategy, or writting a good editor/hack/trainer ( <- my own personal case).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
College loans aren't wiped out by bankruptcy so you're stuck with them forever. This is a particularly nasty side-effect of the government guaranteeing the loans, but really it's fair since the government essentially ensures that pretty much anyone who wants to go to college can get the money in order to do so. This would be a perfectly find system if the people going to college had solid financial planning abilities or a decent bit of wisdom, but given that they're largely 18 year-old kids with little life experience neither of those are true.
Were the loans private, you'd probably see higher interest rates (because some students will default) as well as fewer students getting loans. I don't know if this would ultimately drive down the cost of college, but the actuaries sure as shit wouldn't be letting banks lend huge chunks of money to students wanting to major in underwater basket weaving unless they have wealthy parents who will cosign.
I think the current system would be mostly fixed if you allowed people to count college loan payments (instead of just loan interest) towards tax deductions. That would go a long way towards helping students who have run up a large loan debt and don't own a house, which covers a lot of people since they can't afford a house with their student loan debt.
And that's a very good example.
In the world of TV, you also have people who only casually watch some movie from time to time.
You also have people who follow their favourite TV shows and discuss the next morning what was on yesterday's GoT episode, but beside that have a pretty normal life.
And binge watchers who feel the need to watch all the episode of all seasons of some show they've discovered on Netflix. To they point that they don't even go out of their home.
(And binge watching, and raid players are like binge drinking.
It's okay to waste a week-end from time to time because you're catching up a series/play a 36-hours raid/are fucked up like a piece of shit.
It's not okay when you can't even hold a job because of your bad habit).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
At least make the private student loans be able to be wiped out in bankruptcy.
The banks and schools need to have skin in game to help drive costs down.
If the critical things to know, and "what is on the test" are not the same, maybe the prof should re-write the test.
If a student asks "Will this be on the test?", a good answer is "Anything covered in class or in homework assignments may be on the test."
It's easy to default on student loans; it's quite difficult to have student loans discharged under bankruptcy, but not impossible. Best bet is consult with an actual bankruptcy attorney about what chapter and under what conditions your student loans can be discharged. Most attorneys will consult for free.
Or it could be that kids whose parents can afford to buy them a high end gaming rig have other advantages in life as well.
I'll agree that a majority of teachers do not teach that way... I would argue, in fact, that a majority of teachers do not really teach at all, but are just instructing students on what to do. Any actual learning that might happen to occur along the way is mostly just coincidence unless the teacher is actively pushing the students to think for themselves, as the comp sci prof that I had mentioned above did.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
What constitutes 'bad habits'? Is it a bad habit to work 10 hours a day in an office to 'get ahead' and neglect other parts of life?
It happens that medecine has a very clear definition of 'bad habits' and 'addiction':
it starts at the point where the "bad habit" takes over your life, where it prevents you to lead a normal life, where it takes so much place that it is detrimental to the rest of your life.
(with a bunch of technical questions that can help pin-point existing problems...)
So to go back to your exemple:
- is the Raid Leader happy with his life? is he able to find a balance he's comfortable with between his passion and his life? is he able to function normally? (keep hygiene, health, etc.) (able to keep a job, even a shitty one, as long as he can cover his needs and is happy with his life)
- and about the "career person" might be happy with his life. he might also be so obessed with work that he fucks up his life. There's a name for that "workaholic".
It's all about balance.
In my previous post, I wasn't saying that playing games a lot isn't bad (just like binge watching a season from time to time isn't bad either).
It's being unable to stop playing games (or stop watching movies) to the point that it ruins one's life that is problematic and a bad habit.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]