video game research paper

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Does Video Gaming Have Impacts on the Brain: Evidence from a Systematic Review

Denilson brilliant t..

1 Department of Biomedicine, Indonesia International Institute for Life Sciences (i3L), East Jakarta 13210, Indonesia

2 Smart Ageing Research Center (SARC), Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8575, Japan; pj.ca.ukohot@iur (R.N.); pj.ca.ukohot@atuyr (R.K.)

3 Department of Cognitive Health Science, Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer (IDAC), Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8575, Japan

Ryuta Kawashima

4 Department of Functional Brain Imaging, Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer (IDAC), Tohoku University, Sendai 980-8575, Japan

Video gaming, the experience of playing electronic games, has shown several benefits for human health. Recently, numerous video gaming studies showed beneficial effects on cognition and the brain. A systematic review of video gaming has been published. However, the previous systematic review has several differences to this systematic review. This systematic review evaluates the beneficial effects of video gaming on neuroplasticity specifically on intervention studies. Literature research was conducted from randomized controlled trials in PubMed and Google Scholar published after 2000. A systematic review was written instead of a meta-analytic review because of variations among participants, video games, and outcomes. Nine scientific articles were eligible for the review. Overall, the eligible articles showed fair quality according to Delphi Criteria. Video gaming affects the brain structure and function depending on how the game is played. The game genres examined were 3D adventure, first-person shooting (FPS), puzzle, rhythm dance, and strategy. The total training durations were 16–90 h. Results of this systematic review demonstrated that video gaming can be beneficial to the brain. However, the beneficial effects vary among video game types.

1. Introduction

Video gaming refers to the experience of playing electronic games, which vary from action to passive games, presenting a player with physical and mental challenges. The motivation to play video games might derive from the experience of autonomy or competing with others, which can explain why video gaming is pleasurable and addictive [ 1 ].

Video games can act as “teachers” depending on the game purpose [ 2 ]. Video gaming has varying effects depending on the game genre. For instance, an active video game can improve physical fitness [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 ], whereas social video games can improve social behavior [ 7 , 8 , 9 ]. The most interesting results show that playing video games can change cognition and the brain [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 ].

Earlier studies have demonstrated that playing video games can benefit cognition. Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies have demonstrated that the experience of video gaming is associated with better cognitive function, specifically in terms of visual attention and short-term memory [ 14 ], reaction time [ 15 ], and working memory [ 16 ]. Additionally, some randomized controlled studies show positive effects of video gaming interventions on cognition [ 17 , 18 ]. Recent meta-analytical studies have also supported the positive effects of video gaming on cognition [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 ]. These studies demonstrate that playing video games does provide cognitive benefits.

The effects of video gaming intervention are ever more widely discussed among scientists [ 13 ]. A review of the results and methodological quality of recently published intervention studies must be done. One systematic review of video gaming and neural correlates has been reported [ 19 ]. However, the technique of neuroimaging of the reviewed studies was not specific. This systematic review reviewed only magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies in contrast to the previous systematic review to focus on neuroplasticity effect. Neuroplasticity is capability of the brain that accommodates adaptation for learning, memorizing, and recovery purposes [ 19 ]. In normal adaptation, the brain is adapting to learn, remember, forget, and repair itself. Recent studies using MRI for brain imaging techniques have demonstrated neuroplasticity effects after an intervention, which include cognitive, exercise, and music training on the grey matter [ 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 ] and white matter [ 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 ]. However, the molecular mechanisms of the grey and white matter change remain inconclusive. The proposed mechanisms for the grey matter change are neurogenesis, gliogenesis, synaptogenesis, and angiogenesis, whereas those for white matter change are myelin modeling and formation, fiber organization, and angiogenesis [ 30 ]. Recent studies using MRI technique for brain imaging have demonstrated video gaming effects on neuroplasticity. Earlier imaging studies using cross-sectional and longitudinal methods have shown that playing video games affects the brain structure by changing the grey matter [ 31 , 32 , 33 ], white matter [ 34 , 35 ], and functional connectivity [ 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ]. Additionally, a few intervention studies have demonstrated that playing video games changed brain structure and functions [ 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 ].

The earlier review also found a link between neural correlates of video gaming and cognitive function [ 19 ]. However, that review used both experimental and correlational studies and included non-healthy participants, which contrasts to this review. The differences between this and the previous review are presented in Table 1 . This review assesses only experimental studies conducted of healthy participants. Additionally, the cross-sectional and longitudinal studies merely showed an association between video gaming experiences and the brain, showing direct effects of playing video games in the brain is difficult. Therefore, this systematic review specifically examined intervention studies. This review is more specific as it reviews intervention and MRI studies on healthy participants. The purposes of this systematic review are therefore to evaluate the beneficial effects of video gaming and to assess the methodological quality of recent video gaming intervention studies.

Differences between previous review and current review.

CT, computed tomography; fMRI, functional magnetic resonance imaging; MEG, magnetoencephalography MRI, magnetic resonance imaging; PET, positron emission tomography; SPECT, single photon emission computed tomography; tDCS, transcranial direct current stimulation; EEG, electroencephalography; NIRS, near-infrared spectroscopy.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. search strategy.

This systematic review was designed in accordance with the PRISMA checklist [ 44 ] shown in Appendix Table A1 . A literature search was conducted using PubMed and Google Scholar to identify relevant studies. The keywords used for the literature search were combinations of “video game”, “video gaming”, “game”, “action video game”, “video game training”, “training”, “play”, “playing”, “MRI”, “cognitive”, “cognition”, “executive function”, and “randomized control trial”.

2.2. Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria

The primary inclusion criteria were randomized controlled trial study, video game interaction, and MRI/fMRI analysis. Studies that qualified with only one or two primary inclusions were not included. Review papers and experimental protocols were also not included. The secondary inclusion criteria were publishing after 2000 and published in English. Excluded were duration of less than 4 weeks or unspecified length intervention or combination intervention. Also excluded were studies of cognition-based games, and studies of participants with psychiatric, cognitive, neurological, and medical disorders.

2.3. Quality Assessment

Each of the quality studies was assessed using Delphi criteria [ 45 ] with several additional elements [ 46 ]: details of allocation methods, adequate descriptions of control and training groups, statistical comparisons between control and training groups, and dropout reports. The respective total scores (max = 12) are shown in Table 3. The quality assessment also includes assessment for risk of bias, which is shown in criteria numbers 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 9, and 12.

2.4. Statistical Analysis

Instead of a meta-analysis study, a systematic review of the video game training/video gaming and the effects was conducted because of the variation in ranges of participant age, video game genre, control type, MRI and statistical analysis, and training outcomes. Therefore, the quality, inclusion and exclusion, control, treatment, game title, participants, training period, and MRI analysis and specification of the studies were recorded for the respective games.

The literature search made of the databases yielded 140 scientific articles. All scientific articles were screened based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. Of those 140 scientific articles, nine were eligible for the review [ 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 ]. Video gaming effects are listed in Table 2 .

Summary of beneficial effect of video gaming.

Duration was converted into weeks (1 month = 4 weeks); DLPFC, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex; GM, grey matter; FPS, first person shooting. * Participants were categorized based on how they played during the video gaming intervention.

We excluded 121 articles: 46 were not MRI studies, 16 were not controlled studies, 38 were not intervention studies, 13 were review articles, and eight were miscellaneous, including study protocols, non-video gaming studies, and non-brain studies. Of 18 included scientific articles, nine were excluded. Of those nine excluded articles, two were cognitive-based game studies, three were shorter than 4 weeks in duration or were without a specified length intervention, two studies used a non-healthy participant treatment, and one was a combination intervention study. A screening flowchart is portrayed in Figure 1 .

Flowchart of literature search.

3.1. Quality Assessment

The assessment methodology based on Delphi criteria [ 45 ] for the quality of eligible studies is presented in Table 3 . The quality scores assigned to the studies were 3–9 (mean = 6.10; S.D. = 1.69). Overall, the studies showed fair methodological quality according to the Delphi criteria. The highest quality score of the nine eligible articles was assigned to “Playing Super Mario 64 increases hippocampal grey matter in older adult” published by West et al. in 2017, which scored 9 of 12. The scores assigned for criteria 6 (blinded care provider) and 7 (blinded patient) were lowest because of unspecified information related to blinding for those criteria. Additionally, criteria 2 (concealed allocation) and 5 (blinding assessor) were low because only two articles specified that information. All articles met criteria 3 and 4 adequately.

Methodological quality of eligible studies.

Q1, Random allocation; Q2, Concealed allocation; Q3, Similar baselines among groups; Q4, Eligibility specified; Q5, Blinded assessor outcome; Q6, Blinded care provider; Q7, Blinded patient; Q8, Intention-to-treat analysis; Q9, Detail of allocation method; Q10, Adequate description of each group; Q11, Statistical comparison between groups; Q12, Dropout report (1, specified; 0, unspecified).

3.2. Inclusion and Exclusion

Most studies included participants with little or no experience with gaming and excluded participants with psychiatric/mental, neurological, and medical illness. Four studies specified handedness of the participants and excluded participants with game training experience. The inclusion and exclusion criteria are presented in Table 4 .

Inclusion and exclusion criteria for eligible studies.

i1, Little/no experience in video gaming; i2, Right-handed; i3, Sex-specific; e1, Psychiatric/mental illness; e2, Neurological illness; e3, Medical illness; e4, MRI contraindication; e5, experience in game training.

3.3. Control Group

Nine eligible studies were categorized as three types based on the control type. Two studies used active control, five studies used passive control, and two studies used both active and passive control. A summary of the control group is presented in Table 5 .

Control group examined eligible studies.

3.4. Game Title and Genre

Of the nine eligible studies, four used the same 3D adventure game with different game platforms, which were “Super Mario 64” original and the DS version. One study used first-person shooting (FPS) shooting games with many different game titles: “Call of Duty” is one title. Two studies used puzzle games: “Tetris” and “Professor Layton and The Pandora’s Box.” One study used a rhythm dance game: Dance Revolution. One study used a strategy game: “Space Fortress.” Game genres are presented in Table 6 .

Genres and game titles of video gaming intervention.

* West et al. used multiple games; other games are Call of Duty 2, 3, Black Ops, and World at War, Killzone 2 and 3, Battlefield 2, 3, and 4, Resistance 2 and Fall of Man, and Medal of Honor.

3.5. Participants and Sample Size

Among the nine studies, one study examined teenage participants, six studies included young adult participants, and two studies assessed older adult participants. Participant information is shown in Table 7 . Numbers of participants were 20–75 participants (mean = 43.67; S.D. = 15.63). Three studies examined female-only participants, whereas six others used male and female participants. Six studies with female and male participants had more female than male participants.

Participant details of eligible studies.

3.6. Training Period and Intensity

The training period was 4–24 weeks (mean = 11.49; S.D. = 6.88). One study by Lee et al. had two length periods and total hours because the study examined video game training of two types. The total training hours were 16–90 h (mean = 40.63; S.D. = 26.22), whereas the training intensity was 1.5–10.68 h/week (mean = 4.96; S.D. = 3.00). One study did not specify total training hours. Two studies did not specify the training intensity. The training periods and intensities are in Table 8 .

Periods and intensities of video gaming intervention.

The training length was converted into weeks (1 month = 4 weeks). ns, not specified; n/a, not available; * exact length is not available.

3.7. MRI Analysis and Specifications

Of nine eligible studies, one study used resting-state MRI analysis, three studies (excluding that by Haier et al. [ 40 ]) used structural MRI analysis, and five studies used task-based MRI analysis. A study by Haier et al. used MRI analyses of two types [ 40 ]. A summary of MRI analyses is presented in Table 9 . The related resting-state, structural, and task-based MRI specifications are presented in Table 10 , Table 11 and Table 12 respectively.

MRI analysis details of eligible studies.

* Haier et al. conducted structural and task analyses. + Compared pre-training and post-training between groups without using contrast. TFCE, Threshold Free Cluster Enhancement; FEW, familywise error rate; FDR, false discovery rate.

Resting-State MRI specifications of eligible studies.

Structural MRI specifications of eligible studies.

Task-Based MRI specifications of eligible studies.

All analyses used 3 Tesla magnetic force; TR = repetition time; TE = echo time, ns = not specified.

4. Discussion

This literature review evaluated the effect of noncognitive-based video game intervention on the cognitive function of healthy people. Comparison of studies is difficult because of the heterogeneities of participant ages, beneficial effects, and durations. Comparisons are limited to studies sharing factors.

4.1. Participant Age

Video gaming intervention affects all age categories except for the children category. The exception derives from a lack of intervention studies using children as participants. The underlying reason for this exception is that the brain is still developing until age 10–12 [ 52 , 53 ]. Among the eligible studies were a study investigating adolescents [ 40 ], six studies investigating young adults [ 41 , 42 , 43 , 47 , 49 , 51 ] and two studies investigating older adults [ 48 , 50 ].

Differences among study purposes underlie the differences in participant age categories. The study by Haier et al. was intended to study adolescents because the category shows the most potential brain changes. The human brain is more sensitive to synaptic reorganization during the adolescent period [ 54 ]. Generally, grey matter decreases whereas white matter increases during the adolescent period [ 55 , 56 ]. By contrast, the cortical surface of the brain increases despite reduction of grey matter [ 55 , 57 ]. Six studies were investigating young adults with the intention of studying brain changes after the brain reaches maturity. The human brain reaches maturity during the young adult period [ 58 ]. Two studies were investigating older adults with the intention of combating difficulties caused by aging. The human brain shrinks as age increases [ 56 , 59 ], which almost invariably leads to declining cognitive function [ 59 , 60 ].

4.2. Beneficial Effects

Three beneficial outcomes were observed using MRI method: grey matter change [ 40 , 42 , 50 ], brain activity change [ 40 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 49 ], and functional connectivity change [ 41 ]. The affected brain area corresponds to how the respective games were played.

Four studies of 3D video gaming showed effects on the structure of hippocampus, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), cerebellum [ 42 , 43 , 50 ], and DLPFC [ 43 ] and ventral striatum activity [ 49 ]. In this case, the hippocampus is used for memory [ 61 ] and scene recognition [ 62 ], whereas the DLPFC and cerebellum are used for working memory function for information manipulation and problem-solving processes [ 63 ]. The grey matter of the corresponding brain region has been shown to increase during training [ 20 , 64 ]. The increased grey matter of the hippocampus, DLPFC, and cerebellum are associated with better performance in reference and working memory [ 64 , 65 ].

The reduced activity of DLPFC found in the study by Gleich et al. corresponds to studies that showed reduced brain activity associated with brain training [ 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 ]. Decreased activity of the DLPFC after training is associated with efficiency in divergent thinking [ 70 ]. 3D video gaming also preserved reward systems by protecting the activity of the ventral striatum [ 71 ].

Two studies of puzzle gaming showed effects on the structure of the visual–spatial processing area, activity of the frontal area, and functional connectivity change. The increased grey matter of the visual–spatial area and decreased activity of the frontal area are similar to training-associated grey matter increase [ 20 , 64 ] and activity decrease [ 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 ]. In this case, visual–spatial processing and frontal area are used constantly for spatial prediction and problem-solving of Tetris. Functional connectivity of the multimodal integration and the higher-order executive system in the puzzle solving-based gaming of Professor Layton game corresponds to studies which demonstrated training-associated functional connectivity change [ 72 , 73 ]. Good functional connectivity implies better performance [ 73 ].

Strategy gaming affects the DLPFC activity, whereas rhythm gaming affects the activity of visuospatial working memory, emotional, and attention area. FPS gaming affects the structure of the hippocampus and amygdala. Decreased DLPFC activity is similar to training-associated activity decrease [ 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 ]. A study by Roush demonstrated increased activity of visuospatial working memory, emotion, and attention area, which might occur because of exercise and gaming in the Dance Revolution game. Results suggest that positive activations indicate altered functional areas by complex exercise [ 48 ]. The increased grey matter of the hippocampus and amygdala are similar to the training-associated grey matter increase [ 20 , 64 ]. The hippocampus is used for 3D navigation purposes in the FPS world [ 61 ], whereas the amygdala is used to stay alert during gaming [ 74 ].

4.3. Duration

Change of the brain structure and function was observed after 16 h of video gaming. The total durations of video gaming were 16–90 h. However, the gaming intensity must be noted because the gaming intensity varied: 1.5–10.68 h per week. The different intensities might affect the change of cognitive function. Cognitive intervention studies demonstrated intensity effects on the cortical thickness of the brain [ 75 , 76 ]. A similar effect might be observed in video gaming studies. More studies must be conducted to resolve how the intensity can be expected to affect cognitive function.

4.4. Criteria

Almost all studies used inclusion criteria “little/no experience with video games.” The criterion was used to reduce the factor of gaming-related experience on the effects of video gaming. Some of the studies also used specific handedness and specific sex of participants to reduce the variation of brain effects. Expertise and sex are shown to affect brain activity and structure [ 77 , 78 , 79 , 80 ]. The exclusion criterion of “MRI contraindication” is used for participant safety for the MRI protocol, whereas exclusion criteria of “psychiatric/mental illness”, “neurological illness”, and “medical illness” are used to standardize the participants.

4.5. Limitations and Recommendations

Some concern might be raised about the quality of methodology, assessed using Delphi criteria [ 45 ]. The quality was 3–9 (mean = 6.10; S.D. = 1.69). Low quality in most papers resulted from unspecified information corresponding to the criteria. Quality improvements for the studies must be performed related to the low quality of methodology. Allocation concealment, assessor blinding, care provider blinding, participant blinding, intention-to-treat analysis, and allocation method details must be improved in future studies.

Another concern is blinding and control. This type of study differs from medical studies in which patients can be blinded easily. In studies of these types, the participants were tasked to do either training as an active control group or to do nothing as a passive control group. The participants can expect something from the task. The expectation might affect the outcomes of the studies [ 81 , 82 , 83 ]. Additionally, the waiting-list control group might overestimate the outcome of training [ 84 ].

Considering the sample size, which was 20–75 (mean = 43.67; S.D. = 15.63), the studies must be upscaled to emphasize video gaming effects. There are four phases of clinical trials that start from the early stage and small-scale phase 1 to late stage and large-scale phase 3 and end in post-marketing observation phase 4. These four phases are used for drug clinical trials, according to the food and drug administration (FDA) [ 85 ]. Phase 1 has the purpose of revealing the safety of treatment with around 20–100 participants. Phase 2 has the purpose of elucidating the efficacy of the treatment with up to several hundred participants. Phase 3 has the purpose of revealing both efficacy and safety among 300–3000 participants. The final phase 4 has the purpose of finding unprecedented adverse effects of treatment after marketing. However, because medical studies and video gaming intervention studies differ in terms of experimental methods, slight modifications can be done for adaptation to video gaming studies.

Several unresolved issues persist in relation to video gaming intervention. First, no studies assessed chronic/long-term video gaming. The participants might lose their motivation to play the same game over a long time, which might affect the study outcomes [ 86 ]. Second, meta-analyses could not be done because the game genres are heterogeneous. To ensure homogeneity of the study, stricter criteria must be set. However, this step would engender a third limitation. Third, randomized controlled trial video gaming studies that use MRI analysis are few. More studies must be conducted to assess the effects of video gaming. Fourth, the eligible studies lacked cognitive tests to validate the cognitive change effects for training. Studies of video gaming intervention should also include a cognitive test to ascertain the relation between cognitive function and brain change.

5. Conclusions

The systematic review has several conclusions related to beneficial effects of noncognitive-based video games. First, noncognitive-based video gaming can be used in all age categories as a means to improve the brain. However, effects on children remain unclear. Second, noncognitive-based video gaming affects both structural and functional aspects of the brain. Third, video gaming effects were observed after a minimum of 16 h of training. Fourth, some methodology criteria must be improved for better methodological quality. In conclusion, acute video gaming of a minimum of 16 h is beneficial for brain function and structure. However, video gaming effects on the brain area vary depending on the video game type.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank all our other colleagues in IDAC, Tohoku University for their support.

PRISMA Checklist of the literature review.

For more information, visit: www.prisma-statement.org .

Author Contributions

D.B.T., R.N., and R.K. designed the systematic review. D.B.T. and R.N. searched and selected the papers. D.B.T. and R.N. wrote the manuscript with R.K. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. D.B.T. and R.N. contributed equally to this work.

Study is supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 17H06046 (Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Innovative Areas) and 16KT0002 (Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)).

Conflicts of Interest

None of the other authors has any conflict of interest to declare. Funding sources are not involved in the study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, or writing of the study report.

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Shannon L. Farrell is Natural Resources Librarian in the Natural Resources Library at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities; e-mail: [email protected] . Amy E. Neeser is Assistant Librarian, Library Research—Science and Engineering in the University Library at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; e-mail: [email protected] . Carolyn Bishoff is Physics, Astronomy, and Earth Sciences Librarian in the Walter Library at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities; e-mail: [email protected] ).

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Academic Uses of Video Games: A Qualitative Assessment of Research and Teaching Needs at a Large Research University

Shannon L. Farrell, Amy E. Neeser, and Carolyn Bishoff *

Academic libraries develop collections and services for scholars who use video games in teaching and research. However, there are no assessments of related information and technology needs. The authors conducted 30 semistructured interviews to gather data about these needs and understand how the University of Minnesota Libraries can facilitate access to games and technology. A total of 28 interviewees used games in research, and 23 used games in teaching. We identified a variety of information and technology needs; many showed strong disciplinary trends. The findings can inform needs-based multidisciplinary strategies to develop video game services and collections relevant to unique academic communities.

Introduction

Recent studies show that video games are ingrained in American culture and, increasingly, higher education. A 2015 Pew Research Center survey found that 49 percent of American adults and 67 percent of adults ages 18–29 play video games. 1 The New Media Consortium reported that games and gamification have several applications in higher education, as educational technology and components of blended learning. 2 A search for “video games” in major article indices finds game technology used in diverse research areas.

College and research libraries share a vision of exceptional services to motivate and facilitate cutting-edge research and student learning 3 and have proactively supported scholars using and experimenting with video games. Librarians frequently collaborate with faculty and students to create game collections and interactive spaces for research, teaching, game development, and play. Despite this, there are currently no multidisciplinary assessments that provide an overview of the information and technology needs required by scholars working with video games. Some disciplinary-specific needs are understood, such as the needs of game design programs and curricula, but most information on needs is based on anecdotal evidence.

The University of Minnesota (UMN) is a large, doctoral-granting research university. The Twin Cities campus includes more than 4,000 faculty and 52,000 students, 16 colleges, and more than 300 research, education, and outreach centers and institutes. There is no video game design program or department, but there are a number of research faculty, teaching faculty, and students who use video games for academic purposes. To understand the diverse uses of video games across disciplines, we conducted semistructured narrative interviews of faculty, staff, and graduate students who use games or gaming technology in their work. This paper explores the information and technology needs of scholars who use video games on the UMN campus, similarities and differences by discipline, and how college and research libraries can incorporate disciplinary needs into a strategic approach to video game services and collections.

Literature Review

Many academic libraries recognize that scholars using video games for research and instruction have unique information and technology needs. In 2008, Smith 4 called for a better understanding of game scholars’ information needs, research methods, and types of materials they require, but there are three challenges to understanding those needs on a large scale: lack of information on conducting a comprehensive needs assessment of academic video game users, scarce information about research and teaching needs related to video games, and little information about how unique disciplinary or institutional needs affect a game-related collection or service.

Most library literature on games focuses on recommended genres and equipment 5 or the specifics of acquiring, cataloging, and circulating games. 6 Descriptions of video game collections and services often include a process to gather input; but none of these articles go into detail about the methods or findings, nor do they share a specific plan for how faculty and students would be consulted as technology, research, and classroom needs change.

Laskowski and Ward provide the most thorough overview of classroom and research needs and areas the library can support. 7 They note three primary needs for game-related classes at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC): access to labs with high-powered PCs, availability of course reserves, and access to discontinued games. They propose a variety of needs for game design classes and surmise that those classes would benefit from close liaison partnerships. The research needs they identify all relate to analyses of gameplay, and they propose archiving gameplay videos with player commentary. Since then, game technology has evolved and these recommendations are worth updating.

Many academic libraries have new game collections since the publication of these foundational articles, and descriptions of these collections provide the most up-to-date understanding of the evolving academic uses of video games. It is well recognized that researchers and instructors who use games come from many different disciplines, including education, economics, and the humanities. 8 Some libraries developed partnerships with one department or discipline, such as education 9 or the arts. 10 Librarians managing the game collection at the University of Chicago (UChicago) intend to serve a wide population, from music to media studies to computer science. 11 UChicago also has strong faculty advocates who identified many potential users on campus. 12 Game collections at the University of Michigan 13 and Carleton University 14 likewise support a range of courses and research interests from the sciences to the humanities.

Despite the variety of potential users, there is less documentation about how a library game collection reflects the disciplinary or departmental information and technology needs at a particular institution. The information available shows a surprising amount of consistency across academic game collections: most libraries collect commercially successful games to play on consoles, such as the Playstation 3 or XBox 360. UIUC, 15 the University of Michigan, 16 and the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) 17 have vintage games and game systems available. Though personal computer (PC) games are recognized as an important genre to collect, 18 it was difficult to determine if any academic libraries collected PC games or provided hardware to play them. Carleton University is one of the few that does. 19

There are similarities among the themes of many game collections. Collections at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), 20 UChicago, 21 and the University of Michigan 22 all represent the history of video game development and the evolution of games through time. Many academic game collections also focus on acquiring current releases. 23

Some libraries have unique aspects to their collections. For example, VCU collects games specifically for users in the arts. The arts librarian looks for “games that have certain aesthetics … have significant artistic direction, unique narrative or cerebral gameplay.” 24 Some libraries plan to expand beyond console games, including UChicago; a faculty member from English hopes that “computer and mobile games” are eventually added to the collection. 25 At least two libraries make game development software available: the University of Calgary game resources include “six high performance (liquid cooled) gaming PCs” with software packages including Unity and several Autodesk products; 26 and Carleton University had requests for software including Poser Pro. 27

As affordable game technology evolves, libraries take steps to stay up-to-date with new research and teaching applications. Commonly, academic libraries rely on subject librarians to stay aware of research and instruction trends, and that is no different when video games are involved. 28 Another strategy involves direct faculty and student input, which often happens during the initial development of video game collections. 29 However, some collections are built from donations and gifts like at the University of Calgary; 30 a for those, the relationship between the collection and local research and teaching needs is less clear. Some collections accept donations for a particular purpose: the University of Michigan Computer and Video Game Archive (CVGA) accepts donations and purchases games to create the most comprehensive collection possible, while also collecting in targeted ways to support faculty and student activities. 31

No literature to date provides a comprehensive overview of the information and technology needs of academic video game users. Many universities rely on a handful of faculty advisors to understand needs on campus; UIUC consulted a faculty member and hosted a game night for students to gather input; 32 Carleton University similarly “crowd-sourced” input for their game collection from faculty, students, and library staff, though they did not describe their methods. 33 At UChicago, faculty advocates assisted directly with the development of the collection. 34 The University of Michigan LibGuide for the CVGA provides the most comprehensive list of courses, research, and faculty who have used the CVGA on their campus, but the list is intended to inform students and potential users, not provide an overview of trends about research and teaching needs or inform collection and service development. 35

This paper explores the information and technology needs of games scholars at UMN Twin Cities and how libraries can accommodate disciplinary needs and help overcome barriers to academic work related to video games.

We formulated the following research questions:

• Which disciplines are represented among UMN scholars who use video games?
• Do UMN scholars who use video games collaborate outside their disciplines?
• What are the information and technology needs for game-related research and teaching at UMN?
• Are there similarities in the information and technology needs of researchers and instructors using video games, despite disciplinary differences?
• If obstacles are identified, how can libraries help researchers and instructors overcome them and enhance their work?

To answer these questions, we identified scholars at UMN who work with video games or video game technology. This was defined broadly and ranged from using games as an object of study to using the technology to study a separate problem. We excluded researchers studying “game theory” (a mathematical concept) or studying analog games such as board games or logic puzzles because our interest was in needs related to video game technology.

We used a number of methods to identify a population of faculty, staff, and students. SciVal Experts, a research profile system used at UMN, identified 62 people who had published on video games. The SciVal Experts system does not include all UMN scholars, and the database best represents disciplines that use journal articles as their primary means of scholarly communication, so we also conducted searches of the UMN website to find mentions of video games in biographies, research statements, or classes. Word-of-mouth also played an important role: we asked librarians at the UMN for recommendations and used snowball sampling to find additional names from those we interviewed. Through these combined methods, we obtained 92 total names, which we considered an exhaustive list.

A qualitative approach was most appropriate, as opposed to a survey, since it allowed participants to drive the conversation and focus on topics important to them. Since we did not have personal connections to those doing video game–related work at UMN, interviews had the additional advantage of building new relationships. We sent invitations to conduct hour-long, semistructured interviews to our sample of faculty, staff, and graduate students. Those who responded were interviewed at a location of their choice. Those who did not respond were sent a follow-up invitation two weeks later. Of the 92 names in the original population, 30 people agreed to be interviewed, 20 declined, and 42 did not respond.

Each interview was attended by two members of the research team and was audio recorded with the interviewee’s permission. We asked guiding questions, but the interviewee led the conversation. Instead of transcribing each interview, we used a Google form to code data from the audio (see appendix for codes and definitions). We used a controlled vocabulary to code most topics and captured quotes and observations with free-text responses. To make sure that different coders maintained a level of consistency, we reviewed the audio from the first 15 interviews in tandem and resolved disputes with the codes and analysis methodology. We then assigned a single reviewer to the final 15 subjects.

We took measures to ensure participants’ anonymity by assigning each participant a random number, coding participants by discipline instead of department, and using generic titles (such as untenured faculty) in place of official positions. These methods were approved by the UMN Institutional Review Board on October 17, 2014.

We identified 92 people from four broad disciplinary groups: arts and humanities, social sciences, science/technology/engineering/math (STEM), and health sciences (see table 1). We interviewed 30 people from this population, an overall response rate of 33 percent. The interview sample overrepresented the STEM population, which had a 52 percent response rate, and underrepresented health sciences, which had a 19 percent response rate (see figure 1). It also overrepresented graduate students, who had a 46 percent response rate overall. Participants were split almost evenly between graduate students (13) and faculty/staff (17). It was also noteworthy that the largest number of interviewed graduate students (in both frequency and percentage of total) occurred in arts and humanities (5).

Interdepartmental collaboration was defined as a relationship, formal or informal, between an interview participant and a member of another department. Both formal and informal collaboration were considered: formal collaboration was defined as a relationship based on an externally recognized partnership, such as a project, grant, coauthorship on a manuscript, or serving as an academic advisor or dissertation committee member; informal collaboration was defined as unofficial or casual partnerships based on consultations, conversations, and friendships that contribute to academic work. These data were used to determine whether an interviewee’s work was confined to a single department or discipline or whether he or she had potential connections outside the interviewee’s home department. We found high levels of interdepartmental collaboration in all disciplines (see figure 2). One third of interview participants (10) reported three or more interdepartmental relationships, including an untenured instructor in arts and humanities who collaborated with faculty and students across five different departments in arts and humanities, STEM, and social sciences. A total of 20 percent of participants (6) reported no collaboration or no collaboration outside their departments, including an untenured instructor in STEM who only collaborated with graduate teaching assistants in his department. Interviewees from arts and humanities were the only group where all interviewees reported collaborative partnerships.

The majority (21/30) of interview participants used video games in both research and teaching (see figure 3). Most participants conducted research with video games (28/30). About a quarter of interviewees (7), most from STEM and health sciences, used games solely in research, including a graduate student in STEM who received funding for research and did not teach. Five categories of game-related research emerged from the interviews (see figure 4). Interviewees who conducted research on the development of games or technology typically produced software or algorithms that could be used in games or developed games based on existing technology. Researchers who used games as instrumentation modified game technology to collect quantitative data or used video games as a cheaper alternative to another analogous instrument they could have purchased. When games were used as an object of study, researchers often applied critical analysis or theory to a video game as they would another text or primary source. When games were used to study influences on people or society, the researcher typically used qualitative methods to examine some societal impact of games. Finally, games were studied by some for their educational applications and impact on student outcomes. Some interviewees used games in more than one way, such as a graduate student in arts and humanities who studied video games as both a cultural object and a cultural influence. Similarly, an untenured faculty in STEM researched video games as an educational technology while also examining their social influence. Each discipline was represented in 3–4 research application categories. At the same time, strong disciplinary research trends were present and each category was dominated by a single discipline, with the exception of educational technology. Educational technology applications primarily included testing games and game-based learning principles in the classroom.

Fewer people used video games in teaching (23/30) than in research, but interviewees who taught with games most often used them in research as well. For example, a tenured faculty researched the effectiveness of a mobile game to create and grade assignments and used the same game in several of his courses. Only two individuals used video games solely in a teaching capacity, including an instructor in STEM who had no research responsibilities. Four categories of teaching applications emerged from the interviews (see figure 5). Some instructors designed games from scratch for students to use in the classroom. Other instructors taught game design principles sometimes using commercial games and sometimes requiring students to create their own games. Games were also used as course material, analogous to texts or other primary sources: instructors assigned games in the syllabus or had students watch videos of others playing through a game. Finally, instructors discussed games, game mechanics, or their own research on games in the classroom but may not have assigned games to students to play in the course. Similar to research applications, some interviewees used games in the classroom multiple ways, like an untenured faculty in STEM who taught game design and also used video games as course material. Every disciplinary group used video games as course material and as a discussion piece in class. Some teaching applications were more common in particular disciplines; 4 of 8 STEM interviewees designed a game for their classes and 5 of 6 from the social sciences used games as course material. Overall, disciplinary trends were far less distinct. Table 2 summarizes the data from figures 3–5.

Among the interviewees, 18 types of information were used (see table 3). Arts and humanities participants used the most information sources (13), while STEM participants used the least (6). Video games were used as primary sources by interviewees in arts and humanities and social sciences, including a tenured faculty in the social sciences who studies game symbology. Interviewees from all disciplines used colleagues, web sources, journals and Google Scholar. Dominant information sources emerged from each discipline: arts and humanities, journals and web sources (see figure 6); social sciences, journals (see figure 7); STEM, colleagues, journals, and Google Scholar (see figure 8); and health sciences, colleagues (see figure 9).

Participants identified 17 unique technology needs (see table 4). The following technology categories emerged: equipment, games, programming languages, servers, software, and web applications. Equipment included any type of hardware, from game consoles like Xbox or PlayStations, to mobile phones or personal computers (PCs). PCs were the most common piece of equipment identified as required by the whole sample, but peripherals (accessories such as game controllers) were the predominant type of equipment mentioned by participants in the health sciences. For example, a Wii balance board was used to study involuntary bodily movements. Only five interviewees used console system equipment (see figure 10).

Games referred to all types of playable software, and four categories of video games emerged: PC games, played on a computer and often accessed through a platform like Steam, were the most common, followed by console games (played on a console) and web games (played through an Internet browser); mobile games (played on a phone) were the least common. Arts and humanities and social sciences participants had the strongest need for games, and they use the widest variety of platforms. For example, a graduate student in arts and humanities uses PC, console, and mobile games to study music, and a graduate student in the social sciences uses web, PC, and console games to study representations of bodies. Social sciences have the largest use of web-based games, used by 3 of 4 interviewees. Only 1 of 11 STEM participants used video games in his or her academic activities (see figure 11), a graduate student studying a prominent massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG).

Software as a category excluded video games but included almost any other type of digital application that a researcher or instructor identified as necessary to his or her work. The subcategories were chosen with collection development needs in mind; proprietary software would likely come at a cost and include access restrictions, while open source software would be more accessible for any library or user to install. Other categories of interest included custom software, which was usually designed by the researcher or instructor and might not be widely shared or available, and game design software. Game design software might overlap with one of the other categories: some interviewees used Unity, an open source game design software; some used the Unreal engine, which at the time of the interviews cost money to download and was not open source; and some built custom game design software of their own. STEM participants had the most software needs overall; and, as a group, both STEM and health sciences interviewees reported using some type of software from every category (see figure 12). However, the needs were diverse among individuals: a graduate student in STEM used proprietary robotics software and a tenured faculty member in STEM used open source software to teach programming. Arts and humanities interviewees overall did not report many software needs; only 1 of 7 interviewees described any software needs at all. However, members of every disciplinary grouping did report a need for proprietary software.

Some technology used by the interviewees in this study was free or provided by the university, like a personal computer, but many technology needs required some financial resources to fulfill. To determine how interviewees currently met their technology needs, we asked about the specific methods they used to acquire technology. We split the results on technology acquisition into two categories: graduate students and faculty/staff (see figures 13 and 14). Tenured and untenured faculty and staff were combined because the methods of technology acquisition were very similar for both groups. Graduate students used many strategies to acquire technology, including borrowing from others or using their own personal property. For example, one graduate student in the social sciences used free technology, borrowed games from others, made purchases, and still did not have all the technology he needed. On the other hand, faculty and staff primarily purchase technology. One faculty member in health sciences said, “I usually have a couple thousand bucks in my ICR [indirect cost recovery] account… that’s more than enough to pay for the kinds of things we’ve been talking about [plasma screen, Xbox 360, games].” This trend holds true regardless of tenure status. Faculty and staff in STEM are using more freely available technology when compared to the other disciplinary groups. If the faculty, staff, or students had not yet acquired the technology they planned to use, those responses appear as “other.” Faculty planned to either create the technology themselves or hire someone to create it, while graduate students were still considering their options.

Funding sources differed significantly by status, and untenured faculty and staff are shown separately from tenured faculty and graduate students (see figures 15–17). In general, graduate students and untenured faculty and staff relied on a variety of methods for funding compared to tenured faculty. In arts and humanities and social sciences, many graduate students paid out-of-pocket, such as a graduate student in arts and humanities who was unable to get funding for game skins (armor, clothing, and the like), which were required for his dissertation research. In STEM, graduate students received some funding from grants, but that was not the case for graduate students from other disciplines (see figure 15). Tenured faculty mostly got their funding from grants (10 out of 11 in our sample), with some additional support from ICR funds, departmental funds (funding providing by a researcher’s or instructor’s department), and new technology funds (funds provided by the department, college, or university to acquire technology) (see figure 16). Unlike graduate students, tenured faculty did not pay out-of-pocket costs. Health sciences’ tenured faculty illustrated a depth of funding sources. Although there were only three participants in our sample, they had six sources of funding. One example is a tenured faculty member who had both an external grant and used department funding. Untenured faculty and staff appear to be seeking multiple sources of funding (see figure 17). For example, in arts and humanities, an untenured instructor was funding his work with a grant, departmental funds, and his own money. Figures 18–21 summarize the data from figures 13–17 and organize it by discipline.

Research Limitations

This research had several limitations. If an eligible participant did not mention his or her work with video games on a staff profile page or in publications, or if the participant was not located through recommendations or snowball sampling, he or she was not included among the population of 92 UMN game scholars. The interview data was more limited in scope because some eligible participants were away on sabbatical, did not respond to invitations, or declined an interview.

The exploratory nature of this study limits the generalizability of the findings. However, despite being limited to this one research context, the size of the institution and broad range of disciplines and activities covered in this study provide a rich starting point for future research and the development of library services aimed at these types of researchers. Librarians serving game design or game development programs may observe different needs from those identified in this study because UMN does not have a dedicated game design program.

The open-ended, semistructured nature of the interviews resulted in rich and diverse data that posed some problems when categorizing findings and ensuring anonymity. We used broad codes and categories to capture as much data as possible while also maintaining anonymity, resulting in some loss in the granularity of the data. Additionally, determining how to assign disciplines to interviewees to maintain anonymity was challenging. For example, depending on the context, History can be considered a social science or part of the humanities as it is “multifaceted and diffuse.” 36 We chose to place it in arts and humanities because the researchers interviewed were primarily studying video games as cultural objects instead of the impact on society or human behavior.

Finally, some of the subjects discussed were sensitive (for example, institutional barriers to completing work or acquisition of funding) and some participants felt apprehensive about sharing information. Therefore, the data only represents what interviewees shared “on the record.” Occasionally, the interview location could have inhibited participants (for example, one interview occurred in a public location and two interviews occurred where interviewees’ colleagues were present). However, we have no reason to believe that interviewees concealed information or provided untruthful answers; in the cases where subjects spoke “off the record,” they were candid and honest about challenges with their work.

Demographics and Collaboration

Four disciplines were represented in both the larger population of game scholars and our sample of 30 interviewees. All but one interviewee identified strongly with a single area of study, usually the person’s department or area of research. No single department or discipline dominated; video games were used institutionwide.

Most interviewees had strong disciplinary ties and also had strong patterns of collaboration outside their departments. Collaboration was common for those we interviewed regardless of discipline. We anticipated a higher frequency of collaboration in STEM and health sciences because previous studies showed high levels of formal collaboration in these disciplines, 37 but this did not bear out in the interview sample. Collaborative partnerships took the form of coauthorships, collaborative conference presentations, and participation on doctoral committees, as well as many informal collaborations. Informal collaborations were also commonly described by interviewees and included professional friendships, relationships with advisors and committee members, pilot projects, and interest groups.

These data on collaboration are useful to keep in mind while discussing disciplinary trends around information and technology needs. Widespread collaboration on game-related projects and other projects suggests a need for cross-departmental and cross-disciplinary collaboration among librarians on collection development and the creation of services. Some libraries that invested in game technology do serve a range of users and disciplines, 38 but other prominent collections of games and game technology in academic libraries were driven by the needs of only one or two departments. 39 Awareness of the collaborative partnerships that exist could help libraries go beyond serving one student, class, or researcher at a time, and investments in game technology have the potential to support the work of whole networks of researchers and instructors. Explicit library support of collaborative work with video games could even give fringe projects and new collaborations a space to intersect and thrive. At UMN there is the potential for many departments and subject librarians to guide the development of a possible video game collection, and this would require a very collaborative approach to collection development.

Academic Use of Video Games: Research and Teaching

Video games were commonly used in research across all four disciplines represented in our sample. This confirmed a need for the collection development practices of universities such as UChicago, 40 University of Michigan, 41 and Carleton University, 42 which accommodated users from multiple disciplines.

We did not anticipate how common video games are in classrooms, since published information about game-related courses only identified a handful of classes at any comparable institution, unless they were focused on game design. Additionally, very few course descriptions in the UMN course catalog mentioned video games, and, of the game-related courses we found during our initial searching, most were in the social sciences or arts and humanities. We did not expect so many STEM and health science classes to integrate games as well. In fact, the use of video games in classes was present within all the disciplines, especially in introductory undergraduate courses and upper level seminars. The course descriptions were often vague enough to give the instructor leeway in how to develop his or her individual section, and those who wished to incorporate games could do so. Some departments even encouraged game-related classes due to consistently high enrollment.

Most people in our sample incorporated games into both their research and teaching. We suspect that having a research interest in games may make it more likely for them to incorporate video games into the classroom as well. This may explain why only two people in our sample were using video games exclusively in the classroom.

Overall, knowing how scholars are using video games and gaming technology on campus formed the backbone of this needs assessment. Any effort to provide library support for video game–related work will impact both research and classroom/student needs. Since we know that most scholars are using games in both research and teaching capacities, the support of this work may have double the impact.

Role of Video Games in Research and Teaching

There were clear disciplinary trends in the types of research done with video game technology. The development of video games primarily occurred in STEM, while video games were most often used as a text or an object of study in arts and humanities research. There were also some strong similarities among the disciplinary groups. At least one interviewee in every discipline conducted research that studies “educational technology” or “the influences on people and society.” Since video games were used by different disciplines in different ways, the type of support the library offers should not be done through the lens of a single department or discipline, and a variety of materials need to be available for many different applications including development, study, and experimental design.

Disciplinary differences were more difficult to discern when examining the role of games in teaching. Many classes were new or were only offered once; even so, teaching game design or designing games from scratch occurred not only in STEM but also in social science and arts and humanities classrooms. Incorporating game technology as course material was common, and interviewees identified a number of different ways in which games were used: readings, storytelling devices, and technology in labs. Students were impacted by these course requirements as well. Many interviewees described accommodations for students who did not own a console or a computer equipped to run graphics-intensive games, but some required students to figure out how to access the games on their own (such as via a personal account on the Steam game distribution system). 43

Game design was taught in four classes from three disciplines, which was unexpected because there is no game design program or certificate at UMN. Supporting classes that incorporate game design would be easier if they were all in one area of study, but a subject liaison might only be aware of the one class in his or her discipline. Regular environmental scans might be needed to uncover common technology and material requirements for classes across disciplines for courses that use video games and other emerging technologies.

Information Needs

The most commonly used information sources were Google Scholar, journals, and web sources. The interviewees in the social sciences and arts and humanities were the strongest users of “traditional” library materials such as books and journals. Several interviewees described having to acquire the majority of their texts through interlibrary loan (ILL) because their library did not have the journals or books they needed. Libraries need to review collections in this and other emerging areas to minimize the need for backchannels and shortcuts.

Colleagues were the single most common source of information for interviewees, especially in STEM and health sciences. In one case, a project in health sciences was developed entirely with information and skills contributed from existing relationships. The frequency with which interviewees in this sample collaborate outside their department emphasizes the importance of colleague networks in new and emerging areas. Libraries cross departmental and disciplinary borders and can cultivate a role as a connector for scholars doing similar work in different subject areas with events, experimental technology space, or other strategies.

Libraries should pursue partnerships with existing video game archives and other libraries or investigate shared collection development efforts to help researchers and the public overcome barriers to accessing game-related information sources. Interview participants identified video games as both a kind of technology and a type of information. Games are available in some academic libraries and public libraries, but it is unclear how accessible they are outside their immediate communities or institutions through ILL. Game manuals and trade magazines like Nintendo Power were also used by several interviewees. Public libraries typically collect trade magazines but, according to Worldcat, many often only keep the last 1–2 years. Locating game manuals is even more difficult, as they typically lie only in the hands of hobbyists and collectors. A search on Worldcat shows that relatively few libraries have holdings for either game magazines or manuals, raising the question of how libraries can facilitate access to these materials.

The depth and variety of sources used makes it clear that libraries cannot be the sole gatekeepers of information on this subject. The people in our sample used subscription journals but also ephemeral, noncurated materials (such as game manuals, gaming websites, and streaming games). Other library resources like subscription databases were not as valuable for most interviewees, possibly because they are too narrow in scope or interviewees are simply not aware of them. Rather than collect all of the sources scholars need, libraries can create guides to help scholars locate these materials elsewhere, akin to the University of Michigan CVGA LibGuide. 44

Technology Needs

Interviewees’ needs for devices, displays, and peripherals show no disciplinary trends. Investing in a range of equipment would benefit the largest range of users at UMN. Arts and humanities and social science scholars had a greater need for video games, while those in STEM and health sciences had more software needs. In fact, only one person in STEM identified games as a need, and only one interviewee in arts and humanities used software of any kind.

Disciplinary trends ought to factor into decisions related to purchasing and marketing game technology. For example, at UMN, subject librarians and users in the arts and humanities and social sciences disciplines might be primarily responsible for selecting game titles. Subject librarians for STEM and health sciences should weigh in on video game software selection, since usage would be most expected from STEM and health sciences disciplines.

Among our interviewees, the PC was the most common technology necessary to research and teaching. PCs are necessary to academic work, but there was some nuance to how interviewees used them. PC games are used almost as much as nearly all other types of games combined (console, mobile, and web-based). Mobile games are a growing industry, 45 but they are not used heavily on this campus for academic purposes. Other technology needs are tied to PC games as well; PC accessories, most often graphics cards, were the third highest need in the equipment category. PC games do not require much additional technology besides a computer (unless a powerful game requires faster processing or graphics cards), so they may be more attractive to the researchers and instructors from arts and humanities and social science, who make up the majority of game users. Guidance on collecting PC games is limited, since few academic libraries currently collect them. Most libraries with game collections and services collect console games almost exclusively, likely because console games do not have restrictive digital rights management (DRM) or require an account to play and are easier to collect and lend.

Peripherals were a common technology need, especially in health sciences. Interviewees shared a diverse range of applications for peripherals that have nothing to do with consoles: to control robotics, play PC games, and modify to use as instrumentation. Interviewees also preferred them for their low cost and ability to interface with a number of technologies. Since they are flexible and relatively cheap, libraries and makerspaces could provide a variety of peripherals (with or without consoles) for on-site use or rental.

Acquisition of and Funding for Games and Gaming Technology

In general, interviewees found they could purchase games or technology at stores or online but did not always have funding to do so. The acquisition of games and video game technology was intrinsically tied to funding, which was mentioned as the largest barrier to acquiring technology.

Graduate students used a variety of creative strategies to acquire technology (such as using their personal game collection, borrowing from friends, and other means), whereas faculty and staff simply purchased technology with grants or other funds as needed or used freely available games and technologies, such as online emulators. Graduate students may have less funding available, or they do not know how to access existing funding. The majority of graduate students, all from the social sciences and arts and humanities, were paying out-of-pocket.

Graduate students had the same technology needs as faculty and staff and conduct their own research, often independent of their faculty advisors and any associated funding. STEM graduate students were the only ones receiving grants or new technology funds. We argue that graduate students would be the primary beneficiaries of having video games and technology available, as this would break down disciplinary acquisition and funding barriers. Underfunded graduate students are probably not unique to UMN; and, if libraries made these games and technologies available, graduate students would have much more flexibility in their research. The arts and humanities students who purchased video games out-of-pocket likely used the games as primary research materials, analogous to texts. Since many libraries purchase books for research, it should be easy to purchase games for analogous reasons.

Libraries can also help connect graduate students with funding. Many academic units at UMN provide grants to fund graduate research, and the UMN Libraries subscribe to grant databases and offer workshops on locating grant funding. Since graduate student research is highly valued, it makes sense to assist them in their efforts to acquire game technology by building their grant-seeking skills.

Even though faculty and staff theoretically have the same opportunities for funding, untenured faculty and staff seek more sources of funding to meet their needs, whereas tenured faculty receive most of their funding from grants. Startup packages supported three untenured faculty from STEM and the health sciences, and one staff member reported having to pay out-of-pocket to buy games for classroom use. Faculty and staff for the most part were successful in finding funding to purchase the required technology, but making materials available at the library would put less pressure on faculty and staff to acquire them in other ways and would give them an option to use their funding for other purposes.

Collections in the UMN Libraries are focused primarily on meeting faculty research and teaching needs, as faculty tend to stay at the university longer than students. We recognize that these data could suggest that faculty and staff do not have many barriers to accessing technology and that it is neither necessary nor urgent to include video games and video game technology in library collections. It could also be argued that grants and other funding sources already pay for research and classroom needs and that libraries are not in the business of directly funding research costs like instrumentation, experimental design, or technology development. However, many faculty we spoke to welcomed a chance to collaborate with librarians whether or not the library could directly support their research. Some faculty incorporate games into their outreach service, and many have classes that would benefit from the availability of game materials. We also argue that libraries have a great opportunity to engage with graduate and undergraduate students who want to experiment with games before personally investing in the technology.

By focusing our study on researchers and instructors, we have missed the opportunity to explore implications for students taking classes that incorporate games and gaming technology. What we know came solely from the instructors’ viewpoints; therefore, we do not have a comprehensive picture of how these technologies were made available to students or if they encountered barriers to accessing them. In some classes the game technology was provided, like a health sciences class where Wii balance boards were available to take measurements; but, in another case, students were expected to purchase World of Warcraft and install it on their PCs. Some instructors did note that requiring students to purchase video games may be prohibitive and not directly analogous to purchasing textbooks, as it requires students to own consoles or a high-powered PC that supports gaming. Some attempted to find alternative solutions such as asking the UMN Libraries to install games on library computers and investigating Steam licensing for computer labs. It would be worthwhile to interview students from some of these classes to uncover if they encountered any barriers in attempting to access these technologies.

There is little data available about the information and technology needs of researchers and instructors who use video games in higher education. This study attempted to fill that gap with interviews with faculty, staff, and graduate students from UMN. Scholars from all disciplinary groups were represented and demonstrated both a high level of collaborative activity and use of video games in both research and teaching. As libraries build new video game collections or expand existing collections, they should consider the following findings:

• Information used in game-related research and teaching includes nontraditional material such as trade magazines and game manuals. Journals were the most common source of information identified overall, but some essential titles may not be collected or indexed in library catalogs.
• Video games are most often researched as an influence on society and having a role in educational technology. This research is diverse and may have vastly different needs.
• Video games are commonly used as course material in courses from all disciplines, but console games may not be used as frequently as PC games.
• All of the interviewees needed game-related technology, though there was much variation among the disciplines: arts and humanities and social sciences required video games; STEM required software; health sciences required peripherals.
• Graduate students, especially those from arts and humanities, are at a major funding disadvantage compared to colleagues in the sciences. This impedes access to game technology required for research and teaching and often requires them to pay out-of-pocket.

This study found some consistency in video game applications between disciplines but even more differences, especially in technology and information use. This suggests that the support libraries provide should be done collaboratively through a multidisciplinary lens. We propose a strategic approach to video game services and collections focused on disciplinary needs. For UMN, this would mean building a collection focused on PC games, a few console games, cutting-edge equipment with game design software, and a collection of peripherals with or without consoles, perhaps associated with a makerspace. Each academic game collection should reflect its institution, based on an evaluation of the unique needs of its population.

Since this study was limited to the UMN campus, we would like to see similar studies undertaken at various institutions that look at how students use and acquire games for classroom use, as well as a large-scale multi-institution look at the use of games in higher education. As technology changes and moves away from physical media, academic institutions will benefit from studies looking at the impact of DRM on scholarship and libraries. Very few video game companies have partnerships with higher education, and more exploration of this issue is needed. These studies would provide a more complete understanding of scholarly video games–related work and scholars’ information and technology needs.

APPENDIX. Interview Themes, Codes, and Definitions

• Graduate student: both master’s and doctoral students
• Untenured faculty and staff: assistant professor, instructor, postdoc
• Tenured faculty: associate professor, full professor
• Arts and Humanities: includes any field where the human experience and expressions or explanations thereof are the primary objects of study. History is included here because the interviewees study video games and texts and consider the games as the object of study
• Health Sciences: medical, kinesiology, and related disciplines
• Social Sciences: includes any field where humans are the primary object of study
• STEM: includes disciplines from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
• Formal collaborations: working on a project, publishing a paper, working on a grant together, serving as an academic advisor or member of a thesis or dissertation committee
• Informal collaborations: talking to/with people, sharing ideas
• Both: a combination of both formal and informal collaborations
• Intradepartmental: work alone or only collaborate within their own department
• Interdepartmental (1–2): between 1–2 collaborations outside their own department
• Interdepartmental (3+): 3+ collaborations outside their own department or split positions between departments
• Development of games/technology: researcher has created the video game or associated technology
• Instrumentation: using video games to gather quantitative data
• Object of study: using critical analysis or thematic study of video games
• Influences on people or society: researcher is examining the societal impact of video games
• Educational technology: using video games to facilitate learning and improve student outcomes
• Undergraduate: lower-level classes, primarily for those pursuing their bachelor’s (1xxx–4xxx)
• Graduate: upper level classes, marketed toward master’s and doctoral students (5xxx–8xxx)
• Instructor designed a game: instructor created a video game for use in the classroom
• Taught game design: instructor taught students how to design their own games
• Used games as course material: video games were studied in the classroom, as primary sources
• Discussed games: video games were used in the classroom as secondary sources
• Other: any other response that did not fall within the above categories
• Borrowed/given: the material was owned by someone else and the researcher or instructor acquired from them
• Purchased: the material had to be purchased by the researcher or instructor either out-of-pocket or with other funds
• Already owned: the instructor or researcher previously owned the material
• Freely available: available at no cost to consumers
• Grant (general): acquired funding via another organization to pursue their research or teaching projects
• New technology funds: funds provided for the explicit purpose of acquiring new technologies
• Seed grant: initial capital to start a project
• Department funds: funding provided by researcher’s or instructor’s department
• Dissertation fund: funding provided by graduate student’s department or graduate school to support dissertation research
• Startup package: new professor was provided with funding to set up a lab
• Indirect cost recovery (ICR) funds: funds that the university collects to cover overhead costs when grants are written. A portion is returned back to departments
• Out-of-pocket: the instructor or researcher had to use personal money to cover the cost
• MNDrive grant: grant allocated via partnership between the UMN and the state of Minnesota that provides funding in areas of interdisciplinary research that align with specific industries
• Not required: no funding was required for this research or teaching
• Equipment, console: consoles, such as Xbox 360, Xbox One, PS3, PS4, Wii, WiiU, or any other
• Equipment, controllers, and peripherals: secondary equipment for the gaming systems listed above, including controllers, Wiimotes, headsets, Xbox Kinects, Wii balance boards, steering wheels, and the like
• Equipment, mobile: smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices, including iPhones, iPads, and such
• Equipment, display: equipment used to view video games, including television screens, computer monitors, or any other display equipment
• Equipment, personal computer: includes Mac, Windows, and Linux systems
• Equipment, personal computer accessories: secondary equipment for PC gaming, including joysticks, controllers, headsets, webcams, and other equipment
• Games, web: games that are available through a browser or browser-based emulator, or for download online
• Games, PC: games purchased to play on personal computers
• Games, console: games purchased to play on consoles
• Games, mobile: games that are available on smartphones or tablets
• Programming languages: computer language used to communicate instructions to a machine, including C, C++, Java, Javascript, Python, and other languages
• Servers: computers or programs that manages access to a network resource
• Software, proprietary: software that must be purchased from the individual or company that developed it; often includes major restrictions for adaptation and use
• Software, free or open source: software that is available for free, typically on the web; often allows users to modify or adapt as needed
• Software, custom: software written by the researcher or instructor from scratch
• Software, game design: software developed for the specific purpose to design video games
• Web applications: software application that is available and runs on the web, such as streaming video
• Archives: historical documents or records
• Books: written or printed works
• Colleagues: talking to people in their discipline
• Conferences: formal meetings for people in related disciplines
• Course readings: resources that were provided while taking a class
• Datasets: collection of related sets of information
• Game manuals: instructions on how to play video games
• Game reviews: evaluations of video games
• Games: console, PC, mobile, or web video games
• Google Scholar: freely accessible web search engine that indexes scholarly literature
• Interviews: information obtained by interviewing appropriate people
• Journals: collections of articles about specific subjects or disciplines
• Library databases: catalog of both full-text resources and indexed citations that are accessible electronically
• Newsletters: bulletins that are issued periodically
• News sources: includes both print and website-based news
• Students: people enrolled in either undergraduate or graduate programs
• Trade magazines: periodicals that contain news and items about a particular topic
• Web sources: materials found on the open web

1. Meave Duggan, “Gaming and Gamers” (Report, Pew Research Center, 2015), available online at www.pewinternet.org/2015/12/15/gaming-and-gamers/ [accessed 18 December 2015].

2. Laurence F. Johnson et al., “NMC Horizon Report: 2015 Higher Education Edition,” Horizon Report (Austin, Tex.: The New Media Consortium, 2015), 22, 35, available online at www.nmc.org/publication/nmc-horizon-report-2015-higher-education-edition/ [accessed 18 December 2015].

3. Association of College and Research Libraries, “ACRL Plan for Excellence,” 2015, available online at www.ala.org/acrl/aboutacrl/strategicplan/stratplan [accessed 11 January 2016].

4. Brena Smith, “Twenty-First Century Game Studies in the Academy: Libraries and an Emerging Discipline,” Reference Services Review 36, no. 2 (2008): 205–20, doi:10.1108/00907320810873066.

5. Examples include Mary Laskowski and David Ward, “Building Next Generation Video Game Collections in Academic Libraries,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 35, no. 3 (May 2009): 267–73, doi: 10.1016/j.acalib.2009.03.005 ; Kristen Mastel and Dave Huston, “Using Video Games to Teach Game Design: A Gaming Collection for Libraries,” Computers in Libraries 29, no. 3 (2009): 41–44, available online at http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ831241 [accessed 18 December 2015]; and Diane Robson and Patrick Durkee, “New Directions for Academic Video Game Collections: Strategies for Acquiring, Supporting, and Managing Online Materials,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 38, no. 2 (Mar. 2012): 79–84, doi: 10.1016/j.acalib.2012.01.003 .

6. Examples include Natalie Gick, “Making Book: Gaming in the Library: A Case Study,” in Gaming in Academic Libraries: Collections, Marketing, and Information Literacy (Chicago: American Library Association, 2008), 1–25; David Baker et al., “Lessons Learned from Starting a Circulating Videogame Collection at an Academic Library,” in Gaming in Academic Libraries: Collections, Marketing, and Information Literacy (Chicago: American Library Association, 2008), 26–38; Danielle Kane, Catherine Soehner, and Wei Wei, “Building a Collection of Video Games in Support of a Newly Created Degree Program at the University of California, Santa Cruz,” Science & Technology Libraries 27, no. 4 (Aug. 20, 2007): 77–87, doi:10.1300/J122v27n04_06; and Emma Cross, David Mould, and Robert Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections at Academic Libraries,” New Review of Academic Librarianship 21, no. 2 (May 4, 2015): 129–45, doi:10.1080/13614533.2015.1043467.

7. Mary Laskowski and David Ward, “Building Next Generation Video Game Collections in Academic Libraries,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 35, no. 3 (May 2009): 267–73, doi: 10.1016/j.acalib.2009.03.005 .

8. Andy Burkhardt, “Taking Games in Libraries Seriously,” The Academic Commons (blog), available online at www.academiccommons.org/2014/07/24/taking-games-in-libraries-seriously/ [accessed 5 November 2015].

9. Chris Nelson, “Gaming Reaches into Far Corners of Academic World as U of C Builds Huge Collection,” Calgary Herald (Mar. 16, 2015), available online at http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-news/gaming-reaches-into-far-corners-of-academic-world-as-u-of-c-builds-huge-collection [accessed 4 November 2015].

10. Brian McNeill, “VCU Libraries Launches Collection of Critically Acclaimed Video Games,” VCU News (blog) (Nov. 6, 2014), available online at http://news.vcu.edu/article/VCU_Libraries_launches_collection_of_critically_acclaimed_video [accessed 4 November 2015].

11. Sarah G. Wenzel, “New Library Videogame Collection,” The University of Chicago Library News (blog) (May 25, 2012), available online at http://news.lib.uchicago.edu/blog/2012/05/25/new-library-videogame-collection/ [accessed 30 November 2015].

12. Patrick Jagoda, “Videogame Collection Supports Scholarly Study,” The University of Chicago Library News (blog) (May 25, 2012), available online at http://news.lib.uchicago.edu/blog/2012/05/25/videogame -collection-supports-scholarly-study/ [accessed 30 November 2015].

13. An overview of classes and disciplinary uses is discussed in Mary Claire Morris, “Computer & Video Game Archive Celebrating Five Years of Growth,” The University Record (blog) (Nov. 5, 2013), available online at http://record.umich.edu //articles/computer-video-game-archive-celebrating-five-years-growth [accessed 2 December 2015]. A list of classes and research applications can be found in Valerie Waldron, “Computer & Video Game Archive: CVGA,” University of Michigan Research Guides (2015), available online at http://guides.lib.umich.edu/c.php?g=282987 [accessed 2 December 2015].

14. Emma Cross, David Mould, and Robert Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections at Academic Libraries,” New Review of Academic Librarianship 21, no. 2 (May 4, 2015): 135–37, doi: 10.1080/13614533.2015.1043467 .

15. David Ward, “Vintage Gaming Collection Development Policy and Description” (Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2014), available online at www.library.illinois.edu/gaming/gamearchives.html [accessed 20 December 2015].

16. Valerie Waldron, “Computer & Video Game Archive: CVGA,” University of Michigan Research Guides (2015), available online at http://guides.lib.umich.edu/c.php?g=282987 [accessed 2 December 2015]

17. University of California Santa Cruz Library, “Video Games” (2015), available online at https://library.ucsc.edu/collections/video-games [accessed 18 December 2015].

18. Diane Robson and Patrick Durkee, “New Directions for Academic Video Game Collections: Strategies for Acquiring, Supporting, and Managing Online Materials,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 38, no. 2 (Mar. 2012): 82, doi: 10.1016/j.acalib.2012.01.003 .

19. Cross, Mould, and Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections,” 134.

20. McNeill, “VCU Libraries Launches Collection.”

21. Jagoda, “Videogame Collection Supports Scholarly Study.”

22. Adam DePollo, “Play On: Changing Gamer Culture at the ‘U,’” Michigan Daily (Oct. 22, 2014), available online at https://www.michigandaily.com/arts/10computer-video-game-archive22 [accessed 2 December 2015].

23. Laskowski and Ward, “Building next Generation Video Game Collections,” 268.

24. McNeill, “VCU Libraries Launches Collection.”

25. Jagoda, “Videogame Collection Supports Scholarly Study.”

26. University of Calgary Libraries and Cultural Resources, “Video Games,” available online at http://library.ucalgary.ca/dmc/video-games [accessed 4 November 2015].

27. Emma Cross and Robert Smith, “The Evolution of Gaming at Academic Libraries,” Canadian Library Association Conference (Winnepeg, Manitoba, 2013), available online at https://prezi.com/supsungb2uil/the-evolution-of-gaming-at-academic-libraries/ [accessed 4 November 2015].

28. Burkhardt, “Taking Games in Libraries Seriously.”

29. Three examples of soliciting direct feedback from faculty and students are found in Kane, Soehner, and Wei, “Building a Collection of Video Games”; Laskowski and Ward, “Building Next Generation Video Game Collections”; and Cross, Mould, and Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections.”

30. Nelson, “Gaming Reaches into Far Corners of Academic World.”

31. DePollo, “Play On: Changing Gamer Culture at the ‘U.’”

32. Laskowski and Ward, “Building Next Generation Video Game Collections,” 268.

33. Cross, Mould, and Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections,” 133.

34. Jagoda, “Videogame Collection Supports Scholarly Study.”

35. Waldron, “Computer & Video Game Archive.”

36. Mark T. Gilderhus, History and Historians : A Historiographical Introduction , 7th ed. (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 2010), 41.

37. Vincent Larivière, Yves Gingras, and Éric Archambault, “Canadian Collaboration Networks: A Comparative Analysis of the Natural Sciences, Social Sciences and the Humanities,” Scientometrics 68, no. 3 (2006): 519–33, doi:10.1007/s11192-006-0127-8.

38. Nelson, “Gaming Reaches into Far Corners of Academic World.”

39. Kane, Soehner, and Wei, “Building a Collection of Video Games.”

40. Wenzel, “New Library Videogame Collection.”

41. Mary Claire Morris, “Computer & Video Game Archive Celebrating Five Years of Growth,” The University Record (blog) (Nov. 5, 2013), available online at http://record.umich.edu //articles/computer-video-game-archive-celebrating-five-years-growth [accessed 2 December 2015].

42. Cross, Mould, and Smith, “The Protean Challenge of Game Collections,” 144.

43. For more information, see http://store.steampowered.com/about /.

44. Waldron, “Computer & Video Game Archive.”

45. John Gaudiosi, “Mobile Game Revenues Set to Overtake Console Games in 2015,” Fortune , (Jan. 15, 2015), available online at http://fortune.com/2015/01/15/mobile -console-game-revenues-2015/ [accessed 15 January 2016].

* Shannon L. Farrell is Natural Resources Librarian in the Natural Resources Library at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities; e-mail: [email protected] . Amy E. Neeser is Assistant Librarian, Library Research—Science and Engineering in the University Library at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; e-mail: [email protected] . Carolyn Bishoff is Physics, Astronomy, and Earth Sciences Librarian in the Walter Library at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities; e-mail: [email protected] ). ©2017 Shannon L. Farrell, Amy E. Neeser, and Carolyn Bishoff, Attribution-NonCommercial ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ ) CC BY-NC.

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ISSN: 2150-6701

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

The association between video gaming and psychological functioning.

• 1 Department of Psychology, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Mainz, Germany
• 2 Department of Psychosomatic Medicine, University Medical Center, Mainz, Germany

Video gaming is an extremely popular leisure-time activity with more than two billion users worldwide ( Newzoo, 2017 ). However, the media as well as professionals have underscored the potential dangers of excessive video gaming. With the present research, we aimed to shed light on the relation between video gaming and gamers’ psychological functioning. Questionnaires on personality and psychological health as well as video gaming habits were administered to 2,734 individuals (2,377 male, 357 female, M age = 23.06, SD age = 5.91). Results revealed a medium-sized negative correlation between problematic video gaming and psychological functioning with regard to psychological symptoms, affectivity, coping, and self-esteem. Moreover, gamers’ reasons for playing and their preferred game genres were differentially related to psychological functioning with the most notable findings for distraction-motivated players as well as action game players. Future studies are needed to examine whether these psychological health risks reflect the causes or consequences of video gaming.

Introduction

Video gaming is a very popular leisure activity among adults ( Pew Research Center, 2018 ). The amount of time spent playing video games has increased steadily, from 5.1 h/week in 2011 to 6.5 h/week in 2017 ( The Nielsen Company, 2017 ). Video gaming is known to have some benefits such as improving focus, multitasking, and working memory, but it may also come with costs when it is used heavily. By spending a predominant part of the day gaming, excessive video gamers are at risk of showing lower educational and career attainment, problems with peers, and lower social skills ( Mihara and Higuchi, 2017 ). On the one hand, video game use is widespread, and it may come with certain precursors as well as consequences. On the other hand, little is known about the relations between various video gaming habits and psychological functioning. This study aims to shed light on these important relations using a large sample.

A video game is defined as “a game which we play thanks to an audiovisual apparatus and which can be based on a story” ( Esposito, 2005 ). In the last few years, the amount of scientific research devoted to video game playing has increased (e.g., Ferguson, 2015 ; Calvert et al., 2017 ; Hamari and Keronen, 2017 ). Most scientific studies in this area of research have focused on the extent of video game play and its diverse correlates. While some researchers have emphasized the benefits of game playing and even suggested a therapeutic use of video games ( Primack et al., 2012 ; Granic et al., 2014 ; Colder Carras et al., 2018 ), others have been intrigued by its potential dangers ( Anderson et al., 2010 ; Müller and Wölfling, 2017 ).

Parents and professionals may be worried about their excessively playing children being “addicted.” However, problematic and potentially addictive video game use goes beyond the extent of playing (in hours per week; Skoric et al., 2009 ). It also includes such issues as craving, loss of control, and negative consequences of excessive gaming. While it is still a matter of debate whether problematic video game play should be considered a behavioral addiction , its status as a mental disorder has been clarified since the release of the DSM-5 in 2013. In the DSM-5, the American Psychiatric Association (2013) defined Internet Gaming Disorder with diagnostic criteria closely related to Gambling Disorder. Generally, this decision has been supported by many researchers (e.g., Petry et al., 2014 ) but has also caused controversies. Researchers have criticized the selection of diagnostic criteria and the vague definition of the Internet Gaming Disorder construct, which excludes offline games from being related to addictive use (e.g., Griffiths et al., 2016 ; Bean et al., 2017 ).

Several studies, literature reviews, and meta-analyses have focused on the correlates of problematic video gaming, usually assessed as a continuum with addiction marking the upper end of the scale (e.g., Ferguson et al., 2011 ; Kuss and Griffiths, 2012 ). The degree of addictive video game use has been found to be related to personality traits such as low self-esteem ( Ko et al., 2005 ) and low self-efficacy ( Jeong and Kim, 2011 ), anxiety, and aggression ( Mehroof and Griffiths, 2010 ), and even to clinical symptoms of depression and anxiety disorders ( Wang et al., 2018 ). Potential consequences of video game use have been identified as well, such as a lack of real-life friends ( Kowert et al., 2014a ), stress and maladaptive coping ( Milani et al., 2018 ), lower psychosocial well-being and loneliness ( Lemmens et al., 2011 ), psychosomatic problems ( Müller et al., 2015 ; Milani et al., 2018 ), and decreased academic achievement ( Chiu et al., 2004 ; Gentile, 2009 ). Effect sizes have varied widely across studies ( Ferguson et al., 2011 ). There seem to be sex and age differences with regard to video gaming behavior: potentially problematic video gaming was found to be more likely among males than females (e.g., Greenberg et al., 2010 ; Estévez et al., 2017 ), and among younger gamers ( Rehbein et al., 2016 ).

In addition to looking at problematic video game use and its relation to psychological functioning, it is relevant to also focus on why individuals play video games. Players use video games for very different reasons ( Ryan et al., 2006 ; Yee, 2006 ) such as to distract themselves from daily hassles or because they enjoy the social relationships they have developed in the virtual world. Potentially problematic video gaming has been found to be related to various reasons for playing such as coping and escape ( Hussain and Griffiths, 2009 ; Schneider et al., 2018 ), socialization ( Laconi et al., 2017 ), and personal satisfaction ( Ng and Wiemer-Hastings, 2005 ). Coping ( Laconi et al., 2017 ), social interaction, and competition were among the main reasons for gaming among males but not among females ( Lucas and Sherry, 2004 ). Mixed results emerged concerning age differences ( Greenberg et al., 2010 ), but especially younger gamers seemed to be motivated for video gaming by social interactions ( Hilgard et al., 2013 ). However, so far it remains unclear to what extent people’s various reasons for playing video games are differentially related to their psychological functioning.

Besides investigating the links between potentially problematic video game use and psychological functioning as well as between reasons for playing video games and psychological functioning, it is relevant to also look at which game genres individuals prefer. Correlates of preferences for certain game genres (e.g., simulation, strategy, action, role-playing) are cognitive enhancement ( Dobrowolski et al., 2015 ; Bediou et al., 2018 ), but also the amount of time spent playing ( Lemmens and Hendriks, 2016 ; Rehbein et al., 2016 ) and psychopathological symptoms ( Laconi et al., 2017 ). Males were shown to prefer action and strategy games, whereas females showed a preference for games of skill ( Scharkow et al., 2015 ; Rehbein et al., 2016 ). Younger gamers seemed to prefer action games, older players more so games of skill ( Scharkow et al., 2015 ). However, it is not yet understood to what extent preferences for certain video game genres are differentially related to psychological functioning.

Typically, research has focused merely on violent video games (e.g., Anderson and Bushman, 2001 ; Elson and Ferguson, 2014 ) or one specific game within one specific game genre (frequently World of Warcraft; Graham and Gosling, 2013 ; Visser et al., 2013 ; Herodotou et al., 2014 ), thereby neglecting the variety of possible gaming habits across various game genres.

In the present study, our objective was to examine the relation between video gaming and psychological functioning in a fine-grained manner. For this purpose, we examined psychological functioning by employing various variables such as psychological symptoms, coping strategies, and social support. Likewise, we assessed video gaming in a similarly detailed way, ranging from (a) problematic video game use, (b) the reasons for playing, to (c) the preferred game genres. This strategy prevented us from making potentially invalid generalizations about video gaming in general and allowed us to examine the spectrum of gaming habits and the respective relations between such habits and a diverse set of variables representing psychological functioning.

Playing video games excessively should be appealing to individuals with poor psychological functioning because games allow people to avoid their everyday problems and instead immerse themselves in another environment ( Taquet et al., 2017 ). Moreover, video games offer people a chance to connect with other people socially despite any more or less evident psychological problems they may have ( Kowert et al., 2014b ; Mazurek et al., 2015 ). On the other hand, potentially problematic video game use may also lead to psychological problems because it reduces the amount of time and the number of opportunities gamers have to practice real-life behavior ( Gentile, 2009 ). Thus, we expected to find a negative correlation between problematic video gaming and variables representing psychological functioning such that we expected more potentially problematic video game use to be related to dysfunctional coping strategies ( Wood and Griffith, 2007 ), negative affectivity ( Mathiak et al., 2011 ), and poor school performance ( Mihara and Higuchi, 2017 ). Moreover, we expected to find differential correlates of people’s reasons for playing video games and their psychological functioning: Playing for escape-oriented reasons such as distraction should go along with diverse indices of poor psychological functioning ( Király et al., 2015 ), whereas playing for gain-oriented reasons such as the storyline or the social connections in the game should be related to adequate psychological functioning ( Longman et al., 2009 ). Also, we expected to find people’s preferred game genres (e.g., strategy, action) to be differentially related to their psychological functioning ( Park et al., 2016 ). Finally, we aimed to shed light on the unique contribution of each measure of psychological functioning to the prediction of problematic video game use.

Materials and Methods

Participants 1.

A total of N = 2,891 individuals (2,421 male, 470 female) with a mean age of 23.17 years ( SD = 5.99, Range: 13–65) participated in our study. Of these participants, N = 2,734 (95%) confirmed their use of video games and were thus included in further analyses (2,377 male, 357 female, with a mean age of 23.06 years; SD = 5.91, Range: 13–65). The distribution of participants with regard to sex and age mirrors the findings of past research with males and younger individuals being more likely to play video games (e.g., Griffiths et al., 2004 ). Participants’ place of residence was Germany.

Procedure and Instruments 2

We posted links to our online questionnaire on various online forums as well as on popular online game sites. To achieve heterogeneity of the sample, no exclusion criteria other than having access to the Internet and understanding German were specified. As an incentive to participate in the study, four vouchers of 50€ were raffled.

Video Gaming

Potentially problematic video game use.

The AICA-S, the Scale for the Assessment of Internet and Computer game Addiction ( Wölfling et al., 2016 ), was used to assess participants’ gaming behavior with regard to potential problematic use. Based on the DSM criteria for Internet Gaming Disorder (tolerance, craving, loss of control, emotion regulation, withdrawal, and unsuccessful attempts to cut back), this standardized self-report scale consists of 15 items usually with a five-point scale ranging from 1 ( never ) to 5 ( very often ). The final score (Min = 0, Max = 27 points) is computed using weighted scoring (items with an item-total correlation > 0.55 in the norm sample are weighted double; Wölfling et al., 2011 ). The AICA-S score can be used to differentiate between regular (0–6.5 points) and problematic use of video games (7–13 points: abuse; 13.5–27 points: addiction). In our sample, N = 2,265 (83%) were identified as regular gamers, and N = 469 (17%) as problematic gamers. We used the AICA-S as a continuous variable for all further analyses ( M = 3.98, SD = 3.22, Range: 0–24). The instrument has been validated for different age groups in the general population and in clinical samples ( Müller et al., 2014a , 2019 , but note small sample size; Müller et al., 2014b ). Cronbach’s alpha was α = 0.70. As expected, the AICA-S score was correlated with male sex ( r = 0.17 ∗∗∗ ) and age ( r = –0.15 ∗∗∗ ). On average, participants played video games for M = 4.09 hours per weekday ( SD = 4.44, Range: 0–24), and M = 4.21 h per day at the weekend ( SD = 2.99, Range: 0–24).

Reasons for playing

Gamers indicated how often they played video games for certain reasons. They rated each of 10 reasons separately on Likert scales ranging from 1 ( never ) to 4 ( very often ). The most prevalent reasons were relaxation ( M = 2.96, SD = 0.91), amusement ( M = 2.94, SD = 0.85), and because of the storyline ( M = 2.67, SD = 1.10).

Game genres

Gamers were asked how often they usually played various video game subgenres such as first-person shooter, round-based strategy, massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), life simulations, and others. Ratings were made on Likert scales ranging from 1 ( never ) to 4 ( very often ). Using Apperley’s (2006) classification of game genres, we categorized the subgenres into the main genres action ( M = 2.54, SD = 0.84), strategy ( M = 2.13, SD = 0.80), role-playing ( M = 2.01, SD = 0.73), and simulation ( M = 1.58, SD = 0.44). A cluster for unclassified subgenres ( M = 1.54, SD = 0.39) was added to additionally account for such subgenres as jump’n’runs and games of skill. Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations for all measures (including sex and age) are presented in Supplementary Tables S1–S4 .

Psychological Functioning

Participants provided ratings of their psychological functioning on the following constructs:

General psychopathology

The SCL-K-9 ( Klaghofer and Brähler, 2001 ), a short version of the SCL-90-R ( Derogatis, 1975 ), was administered to assess participants’ subjective impairment regarding psychological symptoms (somatization, obsessive-compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, hostility, phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation, and psychoticism). The SCL-K-9 score is strongly correlated with the original score of the SCL-90-R ( r = 0.93). The 9 items were answered on 5-point Likert-type scales ranging from 1 ( do not agree at all ) to 5 ( agree completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was satisfactory (α = 0.77).

We assessed 10 coping strategies with the Brief COPE ( Carver, 1997 ; German version by Knoll et al., 2005 ), which is the shorter version of the COPE ( Carver et al., 1989 ): self-distraction, denial, substance use, venting, self-blame, behavioral disengagement, acceptance, active coping, planning, and positive reframing. The two items per subscale were administered on 5-point Likert-type scales ranging from 1 ( never ) to 5 ( very often ). Intercorrelations of the two items per subscale ranged from r = 0.32, p < 0.001 for positive reframing to r = 0.78, p < 0.001 for substance use (with one exception: r = -0.05, p = 0.01 for self-distraction).

We measured general affect as a trait and affect during video gaming as a state using the German version ( Krohne et al., 1996 ) of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; Watson et al., 1988 ). On a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 5 ( completely ), participants rated the intensity of 20 adjectives. Cronbach’s alpha was α = 0.78 for general positive affect, α = 0.83 for general negative affect, α = 0.85 for positive affect while playing, and α = 0.83 for negative affect while playing.

The measure for the assessment of shyness in adults ( Asendorpf, 1997 ) consists of 5 items that were answered on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 5 ( completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was excellent (α = 0.86).

We administered the German version ( Elbing, 1991 ) of the NYU Loneliness Scale ( Rubenstein and Shaver, 1982 ). The 4 items were answered on 5- to 6-point Likert-type scales. Cronbach’s alpha was satisfactory (α = 0.79).

Preference for solitude

A 10-item measure of preference for solitude ( Nestler et al., 2011 ) was answered on a 6-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 6 ( completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was excellent (α = 0.86).

Life satisfaction

Participants answered a one-item life satisfaction measure on a 4-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 4 ( completely ).

Self-esteem

We administered the German version ( von Collani and Herzberg, 2003 ) of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES; Rosenberg, 1979 ). The 10 items were answered on a 4-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 4 ( completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was excellent (α = 0.88).

Self-efficacy

We administered a 10-item generalized self-efficacy scale ( Schwarzer and Jerusalem, 1995 ), which was answered on a 4-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 4 ( completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was excellent (α = 0.86).

Social support and friends

We administered the perceived available social support subscale from the Berlin Social Support Scales (BSSS; Schwarzer and Schulz, 2003 ). The 8 items were answered on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( not at all ) to 5 ( completely ). Cronbach’s alpha was excellent (α = 0.94). Participants indicated how many offline friends and offline acquaintances they had ( r = 0.44, p < 0.001) as well as how many online friends and online acquaintances they had ( r = 0.33, p < 0.001). Due to left-skewed distributions, we logarithmized the data before aggregation.

Participants reported their grade point average. German grades are assessed on a scale that ranges from 1 ( excellent ) to 6 ( insufficient ). Thus, higher scores indicate worse grades.

Participants further reported their sex and age. Both were used as control variables in further analyses.

In a first step, we computed zero-order correlations between the video gaming variables and the measures of psychological functioning. In a second step, we computed partial correlations in which we controlled for sex and age because past research has repeatedly shown that sex and age are correlated with both video gaming ( Homer et al., 2012 ; Mihara and Higuchi, 2017 ) and psychological functioning ( Kessler et al., 2007 ; Nolen-Hoeksema, 2012 ). Finally, we explored the unique contribution of each measure of psychological functioning to the prediction of potentially problematic video gaming. Therefore, we computed regressions with potentially problematic video gaming as the dependent variable and sex, age, and the measures of psychological functioning as predictors (entered simultaneously into the regression equation). By employing this procedure, we were able to determine the effect that each variable had over and above the other ones. For instance, we could identify whether general psychopathology was predictive of potentially problematic video game use when the influence of all other variables (e.g., shyness, loneliness, and others) was held constant.

Additionally, we included analyses regarding sex and age differences in the link between video gaming and psychological functioning. Since we collected a self-selected sample where different sexes and age groups were not represented equally, our findings are only preliminary, but may stimulate future research.

Potentially Problematic Video Game Use and Psychological Functioning

First, we examined whether potentially problematic video game use was related to various psychological functioning variables. As can be seen in Table 1 , the results for the zero-order correlations were similar to those for the partial correlations in which we controlled for sex and age. A medium-sized positive relation to the potentially problematic use of video games emerged for the presence of psychological symptoms including depression, anxiety, and hostility. Furthermore, several coping strategies were differentially associated with the potentially problematic use of video games: Self-blame and behavioral disengagement showed the strongest positive relations to potentially problematic video game use, followed by denial, acceptance, substance use, self-distraction, and venting. Planning, active coping, and, to a lesser extent, positive reframing were negatively associated with the potentially problematic use of video games. Moreover, the association with potentially problematic video game use was negative for general positive affect and positive and larger in size for general negative affect. However, potentially problematic video game use was clearly positively associated with the experience of both positive and negative affect while playing. Further, a preference for solitude, shyness, and loneliness were positively correlated with the potentially problematic use of video games. Lower self-esteem, lower life satisfaction, and, to a lesser extent, poorer perceived social support and lower self-efficacy went along with potentially problematic video game use. There was an association between fewer offline friends and acquaintances but more online connections with potentially problematic video gaming. Finally, poorer performance in school (i.e., higher grades) was related to the potentially problematic use of video games. These results suggest that potentially problematic video gaming goes along with poor psychological functioning and vice versa.

Table 1. Associations between potentially problematic video gaming and psychological functioning.

Reasons for Playing Video Games and Psychological Functioning

Second, we investigated whether players’ reasons for playing video games were differentially related to the psychological functioning variables. Table 2 presents the partial correlations, controlling for sex and age. Using video games to distract oneself from stress was clearly connected to a high level of psychological symptoms. Distraction-motivated gamers preferred coping strategies such as self-blame, behavioral disengagement, self-distraction, denial, substance use, venting, and acceptance, but they neglected active coping and planning. They showed less general positive affect and more negative affect both in general and while playing as well as more positive affect while playing. These gamers further reported low self-esteem and low life satisfaction, loneliness, a preference for solitude, shyness, a lack of self-efficacy and social support, and poor achievement in school. A similar but somewhat less extreme picture was revealed for gamers who played video games in order to have something to talk about . However, these gamers reported more online connections. Gamers who played video games to improve their real-life abilities also reported more online connections. In addition, these gamers showed higher levels of general positive affect. The strongest association with online friends and acquaintances emerged, as expected, for gamers who played because of the social relations in the virtual world. Although all reasons for playing video games were related to positive affect while playing, the strongest associations emerged for gamers who played because of the social relations , to stimulate their imagination , and for curiosity . It is interesting that, for gamers who played video games because of the storyline and for relaxation , there was a relation only to positive but not to negative affect while playing. Reasons for playing were only weakly related to sex and age (see Supplementary Table S2 ). In sum, several reasons for playing video games were differentially associated with psychological functioning.

Table 2. Associations between reasons for playing video games and psychological functioning.

Video Game Genre and Psychological Functioning

Third, we examined whether players’ preferences for different video game genres were differentially associated with the measures of psychological functioning. Table 3 shows the partial correlations in which we controlled for sex and age. There was a weak connection between general psychological symptoms and all of the video game genres we investigated except strategy. A preference for action games had the strongest association with affect while playing. Thus, action games seem to be both rewarding and a source of frustration. A preference for action games went along with poorer school performance. Gamers who preferred role-playing games scored higher on shyness and a preference for solitude and lower on self-esteem; they also reported fewer offline connections. By contrast, preferences for games of the unclassified category on average went along with a larger number of offline friends and more positive affect, both while playing and in general. Two game genres (i.e., role-playing and unclassified games) were related to the coping strategy of self-distraction. Because preferred game genre was related to participants’ sex (see Supplementary Table S3 ), we had a more detailed look at the correlations between preferred game genre and psychological functioning separately for both sexes: For males ( n = 2,377), the strongest correlation between general psychopathology and game genre emerged for action ( r = 0.08, p < 0.001), followed by role playing ( r = 0.07, p < 0.01), and unclassified ( r = 0.07, p < 0.01). For females ( n = 357), the strongest relation between general psychopathology and game genre emerged for simulation ( r = 0.17, p < 0.01). Differences were also found regarding the strength of the relation between number of friends online and the genre action: r = 0.06, p < 0.01 for males, and r = 0.27, p < 0.001 for females. Similarly, preferred game genre was related to participants’ age (see Supplementary Table S3 ). However, there were merely differences with regard to the relation of psychological functioning and game genre, when analyzed separately for different age groups (<19 years, n = 557; 19–30 years, n = 1916; >31 years, n = 261). In sum, our results speak to the idea that individuals with different levels of psychological functioning differ in their choices of game genres and vice versa.

Table 3. Associations between preferred video game genre and psychological functioning.

Predicting Potentially Problematic Video Game Use by Psychological Functioning Variables

In a final step, we entered all of the investigated psychological functioning variables as well as sex and age as predictors of the potentially problematic use of video games. By employing this procedure, we were able to determine the unique contribution of each psychological functioning variable when the influence of all other variables was held constant. As Table 4 shows, the number of online friends and acquaintances as well as positive affect while playing were most predictive of potentially problematic video game use over and above all other variables. General psychopathology, a lack of offline connections, and poor school performance were weaker but still relevant predictors of potentially problematic video game use.

Table 4. Prediction of potentially problematic video game use by psychological functioning variables.

With this study, we aimed to shed light on the association of diverse video gaming habits with gamers’ psychological functioning. Drawing on a large sample, our results revealed a medium-sized relation between potentially problematic video game use and poor psychological functioning with regard to general psychological symptoms, maladaptive coping strategies, negative affectivity, low self-esteem, and a preference for solitude as well as poor school performance. These findings are in line with those of prior work (e.g., Kuss and Griffiths, 2012 ; Milani et al., 2018 ). Also, reasons for playing video games were differentially related to psychological functioning with the most pronounced findings for escape-oriented in contrast to gain-oriented motives. Specifically, distraction-motivated gaming went along with higher symptom ratings, lower self-esteem, and more negative affectivity, whereas playing to establish social relationships in the virtual world was related to a larger number of online connections and more positive affect while playing. Furthermore, there were only weak relations between the preferred game genres and psychological functioning. The action games genre was associated with the strongest ratings of affect while playing. These results on reasons and genres may help to explain conflicting findings of former studies, because in our work we examined various reasons for playing, several game genres, and various aspects of psychological functioning simultaneously. Finally, positive affect while playing and a larger number of online friends were the strongest unique predictors of potentially problematic video game use, followed by psychological symptoms, a lack of offline connections, and poor school performance. These findings suggest that, on the one hand, independent of one’s psychological conditions, enjoying oneself during gaming (i.e., experiencing positive affect, connecting with online friends) may go along with potentially problematic use of video games. On the other hand, poor psychological functioning seems to be a unique risk factor for potentially problematic video gaming.

The presented results are generally in line with previous work that has identified a connection between video gaming and psychological health, academic problems, and social problems ( Ferguson et al., 2011 ; Müller et al., 2015 ). However, our study moved beyond prior research by providing in-depth analyses of both video gaming habits (including potentially problematic use, reasons for playing, and preferred game genre) and psychological functioning (including psychological symptoms, coping styles, affectivity, as well as variables that are related to individuals and their social environments). In addition, we identified unique predictors of potentially problematic video game use.

How can the findings on differential relations between video gaming and various indices of psychological functioning – ranging from beneficial results ( Latham et al., 2013 ) to unfavorable results ( Barlett et al., 2009 ; Möller and Krahé, 2009 ; Anderson et al., 2010 ) – be integrated? According to Kanfer and Phillips (1970) , problematic behavior (e.g., excessive video gaming) can be understood as a function of the situation (e.g., being rejected by a peer); the organism (e.g., low self-esteem); the person’s thoughts, physical reactions, and feelings (e.g., sadness, anger); and finally, the short- as well as long-term consequences of the behavior (termed SORKC model). In the short run, according to our results, playing video games may be a way to distract oneself from everyday hassles and may lead to positive affect while playing and a feeling of being connected to like-minded people, all of which are factors that have an immediate reinforcing value. In the long run, however, spending many hours per day in front of a computer screen may prevent a person from (a) developing and practicing functional coping strategies, (b) finding friends and support in the social environment, and (c) showing proper school achievement, factors that are potentially harmful to the person. Thus, differentiating between short- and long-term perspectives may help us understanding the differential correlates of intensive video gaming.

When is it appropriate to speak of video game addiction? More and more researchers have suggested a continuum between engagement ( Charlton and Danforth, 2007 ; Skoric et al., 2009 ) and pathological gaming/addiction, instead of a categorical perspective. In part, this recommendation has also been followed in the DSM-5 ( American Psychiatric Association, 2013 ) where Internet Gaming Disorder is classified with different degrees of severity, ranging from mild to moderate to severe, according to the functional impairment associated with it. The AICA-S also allows for a differential perspective on gaming behavior by providing ways to assess both the time spent playing video games and the main DSM criteria that indicate Internet Gaming Disorder. However, in our study we did not aim at making a diagnosis, but at having a closer look at potentially problematic gaming behavior and its correlates in a non-clinical sample.

In sum, it seems relevant to assess not only the extent of video game use but also the reasons behind this behavior (e.g., distraction) and the concrete rewards that come from playing (e.g., the experience of strong affect while playing action games) to fully understand the relation between video gaming and psychological functioning.

Limitations and Future Directions

With the present study, we aimed to uncover the association between video gaming and psychological functioning. Our approach was cross-sectional and warrants interpretative caution because correlations cannot determine the direction of causation. It remains unclear whether potentially problematic gaming is a factor that contributes to the development of psychological dysfunction or whether psychological dysfunction contributes to potentially problematic gaming. Also, a third factor (e.g., preexisting mental difficulties) may produce both psychological dysfunction and potentially problematic gaming. Thus, longitudinal studies that are designed to identify the causal pathway may provide a promising avenue for future research. Future studies may also answer the question whether the link between video gaming and psychological functioning is moderated by sex, age, the reasons for playing, or the preferred game genre. In addition, it is important not to forget that the present results are based on a self-selected sample in which potentially problematic video gamers were overrepresented (e.g., Festl et al., 2013 , for a representative sample). Thus, future research should replicate our findings in a representative sample. Further, we relied on self-reported data, which is a plausible method for assessing inner affairs such as people’s reasons for their behaviors, but it would be helpful to back up our findings with evidence derived from sources such as peers, caregivers, and health specialists. Our work reflects only a first approach to the topic, and future work may additionally collect in-game behavioral data from the players ( McCreery et al., 2012 ; Billieux et al., 2013 ) to objectively and more specifically investigate diverse patterns of use. Furthermore, one must not forget that the used taxonomy to classify video game genres is only one of various possible options and one should “think of each individual game as belonging to several genres at once” ( Apperley, 2006 , p. 19). Finally, some of the effects reported in our paper were rather modest in size. This is not surprising considering the complexity and multiple determinants of human behavior. In our analyses, we thoroughly controlled for the influence of sex and age and still found evidence that video gaming was differentially related to measures of psychological functioning.

The current study adds to the knowledge on gaming by uncovering the specific relations between video gaming and distinct measures of psychological functioning. Potentially problematic video gaming was found to be associated with positive affect and social relationships while playing but also with psychological symptoms, maladaptive coping strategies, negative affectivity, low self-esteem, a preference for solitude, and poor school performance. Including gamers’ reasons for playing video games and their preferred game genres helped deepen the understanding of the specific and differential associations between video gaming and psychological health. This knowledge might help developing adequate interventions that are applied prior to the occurrence of psychological impairments that may go along with potentially problematic video gaming.

Ethics Statement

In our online survey, participants were given information on voluntary participation, risks, confidentiality/anonymity, and right to withdraw. Whilst participants were not signing a separate consent form, consent was obtained by virtue of completion. We implemented agreed procedures to maintain the confidentiality of participant data.

Author Contributions

BB, BE, JH, and KM conceived and designed the study. BB, JH, and KM collected and prepared the data. JH analyzed the data. BE and JH wrote the manuscript.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Supplementary Material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01731/full#supplementary-material

• ^ The data were gathered as part of a larger project ( Stopfer et al., 2015 ; Braun et al., 2016 ). However, the analyses in the present article do not overlap with analyses from previous work.
• ^ Other measures were administered, but they were not relevant to the present research questions and are thus not mentioned in this paper. The data set and analysis script supporting the conclusions of this manuscript can be retrieved from https://osf.io/emrpw/?view_only=856491775efe4f99b407e258c2f2fa8d .

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Keywords : computer games, video gaming behavior, game genres, coping, psychological health

Citation: von der Heiden JM, Braun B, Müller KW and Egloff B (2019) The Association Between Video Gaming and Psychological Functioning. Front. Psychol. 10:1731. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01731

Received: 14 September 2018; Accepted: 11 July 2019; Published: 26 July 2019.

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*Correspondence: Juliane M. von der Heiden, [email protected]

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• Published: 13 March 2018

Does playing violent video games cause aggression? A longitudinal intervention study

• Simone Kühn 1 , 2 ,
• Dimitrij Tycho Kugler 2 ,
• Katharina Schmalen 1 ,
• Markus Weichenberger 1 ,
• Charlotte Witt 1 &
• Jürgen Gallinat 2  

Molecular Psychiatry volume  24 ,  pages 1220–1234 ( 2019 ) Cite this article

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It is a widespread concern that violent video games promote aggression, reduce pro-social behaviour, increase impulsivity and interfere with cognition as well as mood in its players. Previous experimental studies have focussed on short-term effects of violent video gameplay on aggression, yet there are reasons to believe that these effects are mostly the result of priming. In contrast, the present study is the first to investigate the effects of long-term violent video gameplay using a large battery of tests spanning questionnaires, behavioural measures of aggression, sexist attitudes, empathy and interpersonal competencies, impulsivity-related constructs (such as sensation seeking, boredom proneness, risk taking, delay discounting), mental health (depressivity, anxiety) as well as executive control functions, before and after 2 months of gameplay. Our participants played the violent video game Grand Theft Auto V, the non-violent video game The Sims 3 or no game at all for 2 months on a daily basis. No significant changes were observed, neither when comparing the group playing a violent video game to a group playing a non-violent game, nor to a passive control group. Also, no effects were observed between baseline and posttest directly after the intervention, nor between baseline and a follow-up assessment 2 months after the intervention period had ended. The present results thus provide strong evidence against the frequently debated negative effects of playing violent video games in adults and will therefore help to communicate a more realistic scientific perspective on the effects of violent video gaming.

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The concern that violent video games may promote aggression or reduce empathy in its players is pervasive and given the popularity of these games their psychological impact is an urgent issue for society at large. Contrary to the custom, this topic has also been passionately debated in the scientific literature. One research camp has strongly argued that violent video games increase aggression in its players [ 1 , 2 ], whereas the other camp [ 3 , 4 ] repeatedly concluded that the effects are minimal at best, if not absent. Importantly, it appears that these fundamental inconsistencies cannot be attributed to differences in research methodology since even meta-analyses, with the goal to integrate the results of all prior studies on the topic of aggression caused by video games led to disparate conclusions [ 2 , 3 ]. These meta-analyses had a strong focus on children, and one of them [ 2 ] reported a marginal age effect suggesting that children might be even more susceptible to violent video game effects.

To unravel this topic of research, we designed a randomised controlled trial on adults to draw causal conclusions on the influence of video games on aggression. At present, almost all experimental studies targeting the effects of violent video games on aggression and/or empathy focussed on the effects of short-term video gameplay. In these studies the duration for which participants were instructed to play the games ranged from 4 min to maximally 2 h (mean = 22 min, median = 15 min, when considering all experimental studies reviewed in two of the recent major meta-analyses in the field [ 3 , 5 ]) and most frequently the effects of video gaming have been tested directly after gameplay.

It has been suggested that the effects of studies focussing on consequences of short-term video gameplay (mostly conducted on college student populations) are mainly the result of priming effects, meaning that exposure to violent content increases the accessibility of aggressive thoughts and affect when participants are in the immediate situation [ 6 ]. However, above and beyond this the General Aggression Model (GAM, [ 7 ]) assumes that repeatedly primed thoughts and feelings influence the perception of ongoing events and therewith elicits aggressive behaviour as a long-term effect. We think that priming effects are interesting and worthwhile exploring, but in contrast to the notion of the GAM our reading of the literature is that priming effects are short-lived (suggested to only last for <5 min and may potentially reverse after that time [ 8 ]). Priming effects should therefore only play a role in very close temporal proximity to gameplay. Moreover, there are a multitude of studies on college students that have failed to replicate priming effects [ 9 , 10 , 11 ] and associated predictions of the so-called GAM such as a desensitisation against violent content [ 12 , 13 , 14 ] in adolescents and college students or a decrease of empathy [ 15 ] and pro-social behaviour [ 16 , 17 ] as a result of playing violent video games.

However, in our view the question that society is actually interested in is not: “Are people more aggressive after having played violent video games for a few minutes? And are these people more aggressive minutes after gameplay ended?”, but rather “What are the effects of frequent, habitual violent video game playing? And for how long do these effects persist (not in the range of minutes but rather weeks and months)?” For this reason studies are needed in which participants are trained over longer periods of time, tested after a longer delay after acute playing and tested with broader batteries assessing aggression but also other relevant domains such as empathy as well as mood and cognition. Moreover, long-term follow-up assessments are needed to demonstrate long-term effects of frequent violent video gameplay. To fill this gap, we set out to expose adult participants to two different types of video games for a period of 2 months and investigate changes in measures of various constructs of interest at least one day after the last gaming session and test them once more 2 months after the end of the gameplay intervention. In contrast to the GAM, we hypothesised no increases of aggression or decreases in pro-social behaviour even after long-term exposure to a violent video game due to our reasoning that priming effects of violent video games are short-lived and should therefore not influence measures of aggression if they are not measured directly after acute gaming. In the present study, we assessed potential changes in the following domains: behavioural as well as questionnaire measures of aggression, empathy and interpersonal competencies, impulsivity-related constructs (such as sensation seeking, boredom proneness, risk taking, delay discounting), and depressivity and anxiety as well as executive control functions. As the effects on aggression and pro-social behaviour were the core targets of the present study, we implemented multiple tests for these domains. This broad range of domains with its wide coverage and the longitudinal nature of the study design enabled us to draw more general conclusions regarding the causal effects of violent video games.

Materials and methods

Participants.

Ninety healthy participants (mean age = 28 years, SD = 7.3, range: 18–45, 48 females) were recruited by means of flyers and internet advertisements. The sample consisted of college students as well as of participants from the general community. The advertisement mentioned that we were recruiting for a longitudinal study on video gaming, but did not mention that we would offer an intervention or that we were expecting training effects. Participants were randomly assigned to the three groups ruling out self-selection effects. The sample size was based on estimates from a previous study with a similar design [ 18 ]. After complete description of the study, the participants’ informed written consent was obtained. The local ethics committee of the Charité University Clinic, Germany, approved of the study. We included participants that reported little, preferably no video game usage in the past 6 months (none of the participants ever played the game Grand Theft Auto V (GTA) or Sims 3 in any of its versions before). We excluded participants with psychological or neurological problems. The participants received financial compensation for the testing sessions (200 Euros) and performance-dependent additional payment for two behavioural tasks detailed below, but received no money for the training itself.

Training procedure

The violent video game group (5 participants dropped out between pre- and posttest, resulting in a group of n  = 25, mean age = 26.6 years, SD = 6.0, 14 females) played the game Grand Theft Auto V on a Playstation 3 console over a period of 8 weeks. The active control group played the non-violent video game Sims 3 on the same console (6 participants dropped out, resulting in a group of n  = 24, mean age = 25.8 years, SD = 6.8, 12 females). The passive control group (2 participants dropped out, resulting in a group of n  = 28, mean age = 30.9 years, SD = 8.4, 12 females) was not given a gaming console and had no task but underwent the same testing procedure as the two other groups. The passive control group was not aware of the fact that they were part of a control group to prevent self-training attempts. The experimenters testing the participants were blind to group membership, but we were unable to prevent participants from talking about the game during testing, which in some cases lead to an unblinding of experimental condition. Both training groups were instructed to play the game for at least 30 min a day. Participants were only reimbursed for the sessions in which they came to the lab. Our previous research suggests that the perceived fun in gaming was positively associated with training outcome [ 18 ] and we speculated that enforcing training sessions through payment would impair motivation and thus diminish the potential effect of the intervention. Participants underwent a testing session before (baseline) and after the training period of 2 months (posttest 1) as well as a follow-up testing sessions 2 months after the training period (posttest 2).

Grand Theft Auto V (GTA)

GTA is an action-adventure video game situated in a fictional highly violent game world in which players are rewarded for their use of violence as a means to advance in the game. The single-player story follows three criminals and their efforts to commit heists while under pressure from a government agency. The gameplay focuses on an open world (sandbox game) where the player can choose between different behaviours. The game also allows the player to engage in various side activities, such as action-adventure, driving, third-person shooting, occasional role-playing, stealth and racing elements. The open world design lets players freely roam around the fictional world so that gamers could in principle decide not to commit violent acts.

The Sims 3 (Sims)

Sims is a life simulation game and also classified as a sandbox game because it lacks clearly defined goals. The player creates virtual individuals called “Sims”, and customises their appearance, their personalities and places them in a home, directs their moods, satisfies their desires and accompanies them in their daily activities and by becoming part of a social network. It offers opportunities, which the player may choose to pursue or to refuse, similar as GTA but is generally considered as a pro-social and clearly non-violent game.

Assessment battery

To assess aggression and associated constructs we used the following questionnaires: Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire [ 19 ], State Hostility Scale [ 20 ], Updated Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale [ 21 , 22 ], Moral Disengagement Scale [ 23 , 24 ], the Rosenzweig Picture Frustration Test [ 25 , 26 ] and a so-called World View Measure [ 27 ]. All of these measures have previously been used in research investigating the effects of violent video gameplay, however, the first two most prominently. Additionally, behavioural measures of aggression were used: a Word Completion Task, a Lexical Decision Task [ 28 ] and the Delay frustration task [ 29 ] (an inter-correlation matrix is depicted in Supplementary Figure 1 1). From these behavioural measures, the first two were previously used in research on the effects of violent video gameplay. To assess variables that have been related to the construct of impulsivity, we used the Brief Sensation Seeking Scale [ 30 ] and the Boredom Propensity Scale [ 31 ] as well as tasks assessing risk taking and delay discounting behaviourally, namely the Balloon Analogue Risk Task [ 32 ] and a Delay-Discounting Task [ 33 ]. To quantify pro-social behaviour, we employed: Interpersonal Reactivity Index [ 34 ] (frequently used in research on the effects of violent video gameplay), Balanced Emotional Empathy Scale [ 35 ], Reading the Mind in the Eyes test [ 36 ], Interpersonal Competence Questionnaire [ 37 ] and Richardson Conflict Response Questionnaire [ 38 ]. To assess depressivity and anxiety, which has previously been associated with intense video game playing [ 39 ], we used Beck Depression Inventory [ 40 ] and State Trait Anxiety Inventory [ 41 ]. To characterise executive control function, we used a Stop Signal Task [ 42 ], a Multi-Source Interference Task [ 43 ] and a Task Switching Task [ 44 ] which have all been previously used to assess effects of video gameplay. More details on all instruments used can be found in the Supplementary Material.

Data analysis

On the basis of the research question whether violent video game playing enhances aggression and reduces empathy, the focus of the present analysis was on time by group interactions. We conducted these interaction analyses separately, comparing the violent video game group against the active control group (GTA vs. Sims) and separately against the passive control group (GTA vs. Controls) that did not receive any intervention and separately for the potential changes during the intervention period (baseline vs. posttest 1) and to test for potential long-term changes (baseline vs. posttest 2). We employed classical frequentist statistics running a repeated-measures ANOVA controlling for the covariates sex and age.

Since we collected 52 separate outcome variables and conduced four different tests with each (GTA vs. Sims, GTA vs. Controls, crossed with baseline vs. posttest 1, baseline vs. posttest 2), we had to conduct 52 × 4 = 208 frequentist statistical tests. Setting the alpha value to 0.05 means that by pure chance about 10.4 analyses should become significant. To account for this multiple testing problem and the associated alpha inflation, we conducted a Bonferroni correction. According to Bonferroni, the critical value for the entire set of n tests is set to an alpha value of 0.05 by taking alpha/ n  = 0.00024.

Since the Bonferroni correction has sometimes been criticised as overly conservative, we conducted false discovery rate (FDR) correction [ 45 ]. FDR correction also determines adjusted p -values for each test, however, it controls only for the number of false discoveries in those tests that result in a discovery (namely a significant result).

Moreover, we tested for group differences at the baseline assessment using independent t -tests, since those may hamper the interpretation of significant interactions between group and time that we were primarily interested in.

Since the frequentist framework does not enable to evaluate whether the observed null effect of the hypothesised interaction is indicative of the absence of a relation between violent video gaming and our dependent variables, the amount of evidence in favour of the null hypothesis has been tested using a Bayesian framework. Within the Bayesian framework both the evidence in favour of the null and the alternative hypothesis are directly computed based on the observed data, giving rise to the possibility of comparing the two. We conducted Bayesian repeated-measures ANOVAs comparing the model in favour of the null and the model in favour of the alternative hypothesis resulting in a Bayes factor (BF) using Bayesian Information criteria [ 46 ]. The BF 01 suggests how much more likely the data is to occur under the null hypothesis. All analyses were performed using the JASP software package ( https://jasp-stats.org ).

Sex distribution in the present study did not differ across the groups ( χ 2 p -value > 0.414). However, due to the fact that differences between males and females have been observed in terms of aggression and empathy [ 47 ], we present analyses controlling for sex. Since our random assignment to the three groups did result in significant age differences between groups, with the passive control group being significantly older than the GTA ( t (51) = −2.10, p  = 0.041) and the Sims group ( t (50) = −2.38, p  = 0.021), we also controlled for age.

The participants in the violent video game group played on average 35 h and the non-violent video game group 32 h spread out across the 8 weeks interval (with no significant group difference p  = 0.48).

To test whether participants assigned to the violent GTA game show emotional, cognitive and behavioural changes, we present the results of repeated-measure ANOVA time x group interaction analyses separately for GTA vs. Sims and GTA vs. Controls (Tables  1 – 3 ). Moreover, we split the analyses according to the time domain into effects from baseline assessment to posttest 1 (Table  2 ) and effects from baseline assessment to posttest 2 (Table  3 ) to capture more long-lasting or evolving effects. In addition to the statistical test values, we report partial omega squared ( ω 2 ) as an effect size measure. Next to the classical frequentist statistics, we report the results of a Bayesian statistical approach, namely BF 01 , the likelihood with which the data is to occur under the null hypothesis that there is no significant time × group interaction. In Table  2 , we report the presence of significant group differences at baseline in the right most column.

Since we conducted 208 separate frequentist tests we expected 10.4 significant effects simply by chance when setting the alpha value to 0.05. In fact we found only eight significant time × group interactions (these are marked with an asterisk in Tables  2 and 3 ).

When applying a conservative Bonferroni correction, none of those tests survive the corrected threshold of p  < 0.00024. Neither does any test survive the more lenient FDR correction. The arithmetic mean of the frequentist test statistics likewise shows that on average no significant effect was found (bottom rows in Tables  2 and 3 ).

In line with the findings from a frequentist approach, the harmonic mean of the Bayesian factor BF 01 is consistently above one but not very far from one. This likewise suggests that there is very likely no interaction between group × time and therewith no detrimental effects of the violent video game GTA in the domains tested. The evidence in favour of the null hypothesis based on the Bayes factor is not massive, but clearly above 1. Some of the harmonic means are above 1.6 and constitute substantial evidence [ 48 ]. However, the harmonic mean has been criticised as unstable. Owing to the fact that the sum is dominated by occasional small terms in the likelihood, one may underestimate the actual evidence in favour of the null hypothesis [ 49 ].

To test the sensitivity of the present study to detect relevant effects we computed the effect size that we would have been able to detect. The information we used consisted of alpha error probability = 0.05, power = 0.95, our sample size, number of groups and of measurement occasions and correlation between the repeated measures at posttest 1 and posttest 2 (average r  = 0.68). According to G*Power [ 50 ], we could detect small effect sizes of f  = 0.16 (equals η 2  = 0.025 and r  = 0.16) in each separate test. When accounting for the conservative Bonferroni-corrected p -value of 0.00024, still a medium effect size of f  = 0.23 (equals η 2  = 0.05 and r  = 0.22) would have been detectable. A meta-analysis by Anderson [ 2 ] reported an average effects size of r  = 0.18 for experimental studies testing for aggressive behaviour and another by Greitmeyer [ 5 ] reported average effect sizes of r  = 0.19, 0.25 and 0.17 for effects of violent games on aggressive behaviour, cognition and affect, all of which should have been detectable at least before multiple test correction.

Within the scope of the present study we tested the potential effects of playing the violent video game GTA V for 2 months against an active control group that played the non-violent, rather pro-social life simulation game The Sims 3 and a passive control group. Participants were tested before and after the long-term intervention and at a follow-up appointment 2 months later. Although we used a comprehensive test battery consisting of questionnaires and computerised behavioural tests assessing aggression, impulsivity-related constructs, mood, anxiety, empathy, interpersonal competencies and executive control functions, we did not find relevant negative effects in response to violent video game playing. In fact, only three tests of the 208 statistical tests performed showed a significant interaction pattern that would be in line with this hypothesis. Since at least ten significant effects would be expected purely by chance, we conclude that there were no detrimental effects of violent video gameplay.

This finding stands in contrast to some experimental studies, in which short-term effects of violent video game exposure have been investigated and where increases in aggressive thoughts and affect as well as decreases in helping behaviour have been observed [ 1 ]. However, these effects of violent video gaming on aggressiveness—if present at all (see above)—seem to be rather short-lived, potentially lasting <15 min [ 8 , 51 ]. In addition, these short-term effects of video gaming are far from consistent as multiple studies fail to demonstrate or replicate them [ 16 , 17 ]. This may in part be due to problems, that are very prominent in this field of research, namely that the outcome measures of aggression and pro-social behaviour, are poorly standardised, do not easily generalise to real-life behaviour and may have lead to selective reporting of the results [ 3 ]. We tried to address these concerns by including a large set of outcome measures that were mostly inspired by previous studies demonstrating effects of short-term violent video gameplay on aggressive behaviour and thoughts, that we report exhaustively.

Since effects observed only for a few minutes after short sessions of video gaming are not representative of what society at large is actually interested in, namely how habitual violent video gameplay affects behaviour on a more long-term basis, studies employing longer training intervals are highly relevant. Two previous studies have employed longer training intervals. In an online study, participants with a broad age range (14–68 years) have been trained in a violent video game for 4 weeks [ 52 ]. In comparison to a passive control group no changes were observed, neither in aggression-related beliefs, nor in aggressive social interactions assessed by means of two questions. In a more recent study, participants played a previous version of GTA for 12 h spread across 3 weeks [ 53 ]. Participants were compared to a passive control group using the Buss–Perry aggression questionnaire, a questionnaire assessing impulsive or reactive aggression, attitude towards violence, and empathy. The authors only report a limited increase in pro-violent attitude. Unfortunately, this study only assessed posttest measures, which precludes the assessment of actual changes caused by the game intervention.

The present study goes beyond these studies by showing that 2 months of violent video gameplay does neither lead to any significant negative effects in a broad assessment battery administered directly after the intervention nor at a follow-up assessment 2 months after the intervention. The fact that we assessed multiple domains, not finding an effect in any of them, makes the present study the most comprehensive in the field. Our battery included self-report instruments on aggression (Buss–Perry aggression questionnaire, State Hostility scale, Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance scale, Moral Disengagement scale, World View Measure and Rosenzweig Picture Frustration test) as well as computer-based tests measuring aggressive behaviour such as the delay frustration task and measuring the availability of aggressive words using the word completion test and a lexical decision task. Moreover, we assessed impulse-related concepts such as sensation seeking, boredom proneness and associated behavioural measures such as the computerised Balloon analogue risk task, and delay discounting. Four scales assessing empathy and interpersonal competence scales, including the reading the mind in the eyes test revealed no effects of violent video gameplay. Neither did we find any effects on depressivity (Becks depression inventory) nor anxiety measured as a state as well as a trait. This is an important point, since several studies reported higher rates of depressivity and anxiety in populations of habitual video gamers [ 54 , 55 ]. Last but not least, our results revealed also no substantial changes in executive control tasks performance, neither in the Stop signal task, the Multi-source interference task or a Task switching task. Previous studies have shown higher performance of habitual action video gamers in executive tasks such as task switching [ 56 , 57 , 58 ] and another study suggests that training with action video games improves task performance that relates to executive functions [ 59 ], however, these associations were not confirmed by a meta-analysis in the field [ 60 ]. The absence of changes in the stop signal task fits well with previous studies that likewise revealed no difference between in habitual action video gamers and controls in terms of action inhibition [ 61 , 62 ]. Although GTA does not qualify as a classical first-person shooter as most of the previously tested action video games, it is classified as an action-adventure game and shares multiple features with those action video games previously related to increases in executive function, including the need for hand–eye coordination and fast reaction times.

Taken together, the findings of the present study show that an extensive game intervention over the course of 2 months did not reveal any specific changes in aggression, empathy, interpersonal competencies, impulsivity-related constructs, depressivity, anxiety or executive control functions; neither in comparison to an active control group that played a non-violent video game nor to a passive control group. We observed no effects when comparing a baseline and a post-training assessment, nor when focussing on more long-term effects between baseline and a follow-up interval 2 months after the participants stopped training. To our knowledge, the present study employed the most comprehensive test battery spanning a multitude of domains in which changes due to violent video games may have been expected. Therefore the present results provide strong evidence against the frequently debated negative effects of playing violent video games. This debate has mostly been informed by studies showing short-term effects of violent video games when tests were administered immediately after a short playtime of a few minutes; effects that may in large be caused by short-lived priming effects that vanish after minutes. The presented results will therefore help to communicate a more realistic scientific perspective of the real-life effects of violent video gaming. However, future research is needed to demonstrate the absence of effects of violent video gameplay in children.

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Acknowledgements

SK has been funded by a Heisenberg grant from the German Science Foundation (DFG KU 3322/1-1, SFB 936/C7), the European Union (ERC-2016-StG-Self-Control-677804) and a Fellowship from the Jacobs Foundation (JRF 2016–2018).

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Kühn, S., Kugler, D., Schmalen, K. et al. Does playing violent video games cause aggression? A longitudinal intervention study. Mol Psychiatry 24 , 1220–1234 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-018-0031-7

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Millions of gamers advance biomedical research

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Leveraging gamers and video game technology can dramatically boost scientific research according to a new study published today in Nature Biotechnology .

4.5 million gamers around the world have advanced medical science by helping to reconstruct microbial evolutionary histories using a minigame included inside the critically and commercially successful video game, Borderlands 3 . Their playing has led to a significantly refined estimate of the relationships of microbes in the human gut. The results of this collaboration will both substantially advance our knowledge of the microbiome and improve on the AI programs that will be used to carry out this work in future.

Tracing the evolutionary relationships of bacteria

By playing Borderlands Science , a mini-game within the looter-shooter video game Borderlands 3 , these players have helped trace the evolutionary relationships of more than a million different kinds of bacteria that live in the human gut, some of which play a crucial role in our health. This information represents an exponential increase in what we have discovered about the microbiome up till now. By aligning rows of tiles which represent the genetic building blocks of different microbes, humans have been able to take on tasks that even the best existing computer algorithms have been unable to solve yet.

The project was led by McGill University researchers, developed in collaboration with Gearbox Entertainment Company , an award-winning interactive entertainment company, and Massively Multiplayer Online Science ( MMOS ) , a Swiss IT company connecting scientists to video games), and supported by the expertise and genomic material from the Microsetta Initiative led by Rob Knight from the Departments of Pediatrics, Bioengineering, and Computer Science & Engineering at the University of California San Diego.

Humans improve on existing algorithms and lay groundwork for the future

Not only have the gamers improved on the results produced by the existing programs used to analyze DNA sequences, but they are also helping lay the groundwork for improved AI programs that can be used in future.

“We didn’t know whether the players of a popular game like Borderlands 3 would be interested or whether the results would be good enough to improve on what was already known about microbial evolution. But we’ve been amazed by the results.” says Jérôme Waldispühl , an associate professor in McGill’s School of Computer Science and senior author on the paper published today. “In half a day, the Borderlands Science players collected five times more data about microbial DNA sequences than our earlier game, Phylo , had collected over a 10-year period.”

The idea for integrating DNA analysis into a commercial video game with mass market appeal came from Attila Szantner, an adjunct professor in McGill’s School of Computer Science and CEO and co-founder of MMOS . “As almost half of the world population is playing with videogames, it is of utmost importance that we find new creative ways to extract value from all this time and brainpower that we spend gaming,” says Szantner. “ Borderlands Science shows how far we can get by teaming up with the game industry and its communities to tackle the big challenges of our times.”

“Gearbox’s developers were eager to engage millions of Borderlands players globally with our creation of an appealing in-game experience to demonstrate how clever minds playing Borderlands are capable of producing tangible, useful, and valuable scientific data at a level not approachable with non-interactive technology and mediums,” said Randy Pitchford , founder and CEO of Gearbox Entertainment Company. “I'm proud that Borderlands Science has become one of the largest and most accomplished citizen science projects of all time, forecasting the opportunity for similar projects in future video games and pushing the boundaries of the positive effect that video games can make on the world.”

Relating microbes to disease and lifestyle

The tens of trillions of microbes that colonize our bodies play a crucial role in maintaining human health. But microbial communities can change over time in response to factors such as diet, medications, and lifestyle habits.

Because of the sheer number of microbes involved, scientists are still only in the early days of being able to identify which microorganisms are affected by, or can affect, which conditions.

Which is why the researchers’ project and the results from the gamers are so important.

“We expect to be able to use this information to relate specific kinds of microbes to what we eat, to how we age, and to the many diseases ranging from inflammatory bowel disease to Alzheimer’s that we now know microbes to be involved in,” adds Knight, who also directs the Center for Microbiome Innovation at the UC San Diego. “Because evolution is a great guide to function, having a better tree relating our microbes to one another gives us a more precise view of what they are doing within and around us.”

Building communities to advance knowledge

“Here we have 4.5 million people who contributed to science. In a sense, this result is theirs too and they should feel proud about it,” says Waldispühl . “It shows that we can fight the fear or misconceptions that members of the public may have about science and start building communities who work collectively to advance knowledge.”

“ Borderlands Science created an incredible opportunity to engage with citizen scientists on a novel and important problem, using data generated by a separate massive citizen science project,” adds Daniel McDonald, the Scientific Director of the Microsetta Initiative. “These results demonstrate the remarkable value of open access data, and the scale of what is possible with inclusive practices in scientific endeavors.”

“ Improving microbial phylogeny with citizen science within a mass-market video game ” by Roman Sarrazin-Gendron et al was published in Nature Biotechnology DOI: 10.1038/s41587-024-02175-6

The research was funded in part by Genome Canada and Génome Québec.

About McGill University

Founded in Montreal, Quebec, in 1821, McGill University is Canada’s top ranked medical doctoral university. McGill is consistently ranked as one of the top universities, both nationally and internationally. It is a world-renowned institution of higher learning with research activities spanning three campuses, 12 faculties, 14 professional schools, 300 programs of study and over 39,000 students, including more than 10,400 graduate students. McGill attracts students from over 150 countries around the world, its 12,000 international students making up 30% of the student body. Over half of McGill students claim a first language other than English, including approximately 20% of our students who say French is their mother tongue. 

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