Children, adults and the influence on their academic performance of video games and cell phones
March 2009

Many questions arise from this new situation. The rapidly evolving and expanding information technology continues to create more hot issues that need answers and there is an urgent need to find appropriate ways to manage them.

Parents, educators and the society in general are trying to understand the implications for the mental, cognitive and physical development of children and adolescents of the widespread use of the new technologies. 

Furthermore, beyond childhood and adolescence the influences and implications in the adult population of video games and cell phone technologies are as well a subject of intense research by the scientific community. There are many questions needing answers such as:

• What are the implications for creativity?
• How the academic performance is affected?
• Are there any benefits for skills such as spatial visualization, rapidity of decision, cognitive expansion and other abilities needed in various professions?
• How social interactions, behavior or aggressiveness are modulated by the video games?

Using cell phones and playing video games may not be as harmful to children’s academic performance as previously believed, according to new research by a team of Michigan State University (MSU) scholars.

In fact, cell phones had no effect on academic performance among a group of 12-year-olds, the researchers found in a three-year study recently published.

And while the researchers found a strong relationship between video games and lower grade point averages, playing video games did not appear to affect math skills and had a positive relationship with visual-spatial skills.

These skills – in which a child learns visually, by thinking in pictures and images – are considered the “training wheels” for performance in science, technology, engineering and math.

“And these are the areas where we want to see improvements in our children’s academic performance,” said lead investigator Linda Jackson, MSU professor of psychology.

The study is part of a larger MSU project, funded by the National Science Foundation, in which Jackson and colleagues are exploring the effects of technology on children’s academic performance and their social life, psychological well-being and moral reasoning.

The project, funded by the National Science Foundation is designed to examine the nature and extent of children’s use of Information Technology (IT), and how using IT effects children’s cognitive, social, psychological and moral development.

Specifically, the project examines whether using IT, particularly the Internet and video games, influences children’s cognitive outcomes (e.g., visual skills, GPA, scores on standardized achievement test), social interactions (e.g., relationships with friends and family), psychological well-being (e.g., self-esteem, self-concept) and moral development (e.g., reasoning about “right and wrong” in both the virtual and “real” physical world).

The researchers surveyed students from 20 middle schools and an after-school center in Michigan. They asked how often the children used cell phones and played video games, both online and offline, and measured the children’s grades, visual-spatial skills and performance on standardized tests in math and reading.

As expected, females used cell phones more frequently than did males, while males played video games far more frequently than did females. Some 81 percent of adolescents play video games online, according to the Pew Internet and American Life Project.

Jackson said it’s unrealistic to think kids will stop playing video games, so video game developers should focus more on the elements that develop visual-spatial skills and less on themes such as violence. Also, more games should be developed that appeal to girls to better develop their visual-spatial skills, which are essential in professions such as surgery, she said.

“Girls are at a disadvantage by not having that three-dimensional experience,” Jackson said. “So when they get to medical school and they’re doing surgery in the virtual world, they’re not used to it.”

When it comes to cell phones, Jackson said she saw no detrimental effects to the students’ academic performance. However, further research is needed on older students who are more apt to engage in “devious behavior” such as text-messaging test answers to each other, she said.

The global cell-phone market had 1.8 billion subscribers in 2007 – a number that is expected to reach 3 billion by 2010, according to Baskerville Communications in London.

According to research done by scientists from the Penn State Media Effects Research Laboratory video games that energize players and induce a positive mood could also enhance creativity, according to media researchers. However, they also found that players who were not highly energized and had a negative mood, registered the highest creativity.

"You need defocused attention for being creative," said S. Shyam Sundar, professor of film, video and media studies at Penn State. "When you have low arousal and are negative, you tend to focus on detail and become more analytical."

Sundar and Elizabeth Hutton, a Penn State graduate student, are trying to understand the value of video games as a vehicle for sparking positive social traits, such as creativity. Fun and games aside, video games are viewed as a serious communication technology. Schools, corporations and even the government are increasingly employing it as a tool in enhancing learning and decision-making.

"Video games are not just for entertainment alone," says Sundar. "We are trying to figure out how they can aid in education as well."

"We are not looking just at creative games, but what emotional elements of games can serve as an engine to spark creative thought and new problem solving skills," said Sundar, who is also a founder of the Penn State Media Effects Research Laboratory.

He envisions a scenario in which the emotional drivers that video games provide could be harnessed for creative outcomes, either in a classroom setting, or for corporate decision-making.

"The key is to generate emotion," explained Sundar. "Ideally, a good teacher can energize the class and make them much more emotionally invested through presentations, guest lectures, and group discussions. Video games can help achieve that in an already simulated way."

Bibliography

1. Conference Proceedings, International Association for Development of the Information Society, IADIS, Barcelona, Spain, 26 - 28 February 2009.
2. Michigan State University
3. National Science Foundation
4. Penn State
5. Penn State Media Effects Research Laboratory