Is moderate gaming recommended from a developmental psychology perspective?

Dear Yanick

Thank you for your question. You’re right, there’s no simple ‘either/or’ answer to this. Video games are simply part of young people’s everyday lives these days. In Switzerland, according to the 2022 JAMES study, 79 per cent of young people aged between 12 and 19 who were surveyed play video games at least occasionally, with boys (93 per cent) doing so more frequently than girls (65 per cent). Gaming can have benefits for development, but also drawbacks.

Benefits

Thinking: I find it fascinating that playing action games (such as first-person shooters or racing games) can improve visual acuity. Skill-based games such as Tetris or Portal can promote spatial awareness as well as important cognitive skills such as flexible thinking, planning and impulse control – the so-called executive functions.

Creativity: So-called open-world games in particular, such as Minecraft, train planning skills and logical problem-solving. Minecraft is also useful in other areas. For example, it promotes what is known as divergent thinking. This refers to ‘out-of-the-box thinking’, where you find not just one, but as many different solutions as possible to a problem.

Social skills: Games in which you play alongside others (e.g. Fortnite, Among Us) strengthen social skills such as cooperation, communication and the ability to empathise with others, particularly when played cooperatively (with each other) rather than competitively (against each other).

Frustration tolerance: Gaming can improve your frustration tolerance. When playing, you’ll inevitably have to cope with setbacks time and again. Evidence suggests that children who regularly play challenging games are better able to cope with failure.

However – and this is important – frustration tolerance is a very good example of how gaming does not only have positive effects, and that it is not simply a case of ‘either/or’. The research findings are actually mixed, particularly when it comes to frustration tolerance. On the one hand, games offer opportunities to practise frustration tolerance. On the other hand, however, excessive gaming can have exactly the opposite effect. That’s why I’m now going to briefly touch on the potential downsides.

Drawbacks

Risk of addiction: You may be familiar with this: you just wanted to play ‘one more round’, and suddenly three hours have gone by. For some young people, this becomes a real problem. In 2018, the WHO recognised ‘gaming disorder’ as an official diagnosis, which is linked to sleep disturbances, social isolation and depression. This puts computer game addiction on a par with other addictions.

It is important to know the following: Video game addiction is diagnosed according to clear clinical criteria: loss of control over gaming, gaming becoming more important than anything else, continuing to play despite negative consequences (e.g. poor grades, arguments with parents or friends) – and this must persist for at least 12 months.

Sleep: Playing intensively in the evening in particular can disrupt sleep. Unlike watching television, gaming is interactive and often competitive. This leads to an increase in heart rate and the brain working at full speed. Intense gaming can mean it takes you longer to fall asleep.

Time-wasting problem: Excessive gaming can also lead to what are known as displacement effects: If you play too much, you automatically have less time for other activities (exercise, social interaction, reading).

Mental health: Can gaming affect your well-being? Here, too, it depends on the amount. Moderate gaming does not generally have any significant negative effects on the well-being of children and young people. Problematic or excessive gaming, however, is associated with higher levels of depression and anxiety. This works both ways: gaming can lead to depression, but adolescents with depression are also more likely to game excessively

Parents can help

Parents play a very important role in the development of children and young people, particularly when they have a supportive, trusting relationship with their children and strike the right balance between structure and autonomy. Parental guidance, for example through co-gaming or non-judgemental discussions about game content – that is, without immediately passing judgement or imposing bans – can reinforce positive effects and reduce negative ones.

Conclusion

So, from a developmental psychology perspective, is moderate gaming recommended? One to two hours of gaming a day is perfectly fine – as long as other important things (sleep, exercise, meeting friends, school) aren’t neglected. Computer games can help develop important skills. It’s important that the games are suitable for your age – check the PEGI age ratings and think about whether extreme violence or horror is really what you want to see, and make sure you can and are allowed to talk to your parents about gaming. So the answer to your question is a clear ‘yes’ with an equally clear ‘but’.

Like so many things, gaming cannot be viewed in isolation. Someone who plays secretly and on their own has a different experience to someone who plays together with others. How you play is more important than what you play. What’s more, the dynamics change as you get older. The details and information mentioned here relate more to teenagers. For younger children, it makes sense to adapt both the time spent playing and the content to suit their age.