Game Player Data

Video games are no longer just a form of entertainment for children and young adults alone, and the old stereotypes of a gamer no longer apply. The ESA's "2009 Essential Facts About the Computer and Video Game Industry" show that 68 percent of American households play computer and video games. The research also reveals other interesting demographic facts about today's gamers and the games they play, including:

The average gamer is 35 years old and has been playing for 12 years.

Forty percent of all players are women and women over 18 years of age are one of the industry's fastest growing demographics. Today, adult women represent a greater portion of the game-playing population (34 percent) than boys age 17 or younger (18 percent).

Twenty-five percent of game players are over the age of 50, an increase from nine percent in 1999. This figure is sure to rise in coming years with nursing homes and senior centers across the nation now incorporating video games into their activities.

Forty-two percent of homes in America have a video game console.

Fifty-seven percent of online game players are male and 43 percent are female. Thirty-seven percent of heads of households report they play games on wireless devices such as a cell phone or PDA, up from 20% in 2002.

Ninety-two percent of the time parents are present at the time games are purchased or rented. Seventy-seven percent of parents believe that the parental controls available in all new video game consoles are useful. In addition, 63 percent of parents believe games are a positive part of their children’s lives.

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Games & Violence

2007 Essential Facts About the Computer and Video Game Industry

Download the 2008

Essential Facts About

Games and Violence

Facts, common sense and numerous studies all debunk the myth that there is a link between computer and video games and violence. Blaming video games for violence in the real world is no more productive than blaming the news media for bringing crimes of violence into our homes night after night. Having someone or something to blame is convenient, especially after an incident of terrible and unexplainable violence. But to do so is simplistic, and more importantly, it's wrong.

Credible real-world evidence demonstrates the fallacy of linking games and violence:

Violent crime, particularly among the young, has decreased dramatically since the early 1990s. During the same period of time, video games have steadily increased in popularity and use, exactly the opposite of what one would expect if there were a causal link.

Many games with violent content sold in the U.S. -- and some with far more violence -- are also sold in foreign markets. However, the level of violent crime in these foreign markets is considerably lower than that in the U.S., suggesting that influences such as the background of the individual, the availability of guns and other factors are more relevant to understanding the cause of any particular crime.

Numerous authorities, including the U.S. Surgeon General, the Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Communications Commission and several U.S. District Courts have examined the scientific record and found that it does not establish any causal link between violent programming and violent behavior.

The truth is, there is no scientific research that validates a link between computer and video games and violence, despite lots of overheated rhetoric from the industry's detractors. Instead, a host of respected researchers has concluded that there is no link between media violence and violent crime.

Here is what some of those experts and studies say:

"...the research data don't support the simplistic claims being made about a causal relationship between violent video games and real-world violence perpetrated by the broad range of teenagers who play them. More important, focusing on such easy but minor targets as violent video games causes parents, social activists and public policy makers to ignore the much more powerful and significant causes of youth violence that have already been well established, including a range of social, behavioral, economic, biological and mental health factors. In other words, the knee-jerk responses distract us from more complex but more important problems."

— Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl K. Olson, Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games, And What Parents Can Do, 2008, p. 190.

To learn more about this book please visit www.grandtheftchildhood.com.

"… critics continue to target video games, as their graphics and plot capabilities grow more complex and at times more disturbing. Meanwhile, youth crime rates continue to decline. If we want to understand why young people, particularly in middle-class or otherwise stable environments, become homicidal, we need to look beyond the games they play. While all forms of media merit critical analysis, so do the supposedly 'good' neighborhoods and families that occasionally produce young killers."

— K. Sternheimer, "Do Video Games Kill?", Contexts, Vol. 6, Issue 1, pp. 13-17, Winter, 2007.

To read this research in its entirety please click here.

"The search for video game violence effects is a reasonable one. However researchers must be prepared to test their assumptions and the quality of the data that they are producing. When tragedies such as the Columbine High School shooting occur, it is tempting to look for 'scapegoat' answers to a complex problem. It is incumbent on researchers that they not let themselves be side-tracked by a prior hypothesis that may distract the scientific community and the general public from the real biological, social and family influences on violent behavior."

— C.J. Ferguson, "Evidence for publication bias in video game violence effects literature: A meta-analytic review," Aggression and Violent Behavior (2007), p. 17.

To read this research in its entirety please visit http://tinyurl.com/354xdf.

There are "many inconsistencies in the reported amount of research into media violence. Put simply, there are a lot of myths, misinterpretations, and mis-representations surrounding the quantity and quality of research on this issue."

— Raymond Boyle and Matthew Hibberd, "Review of research on the impact of violent computer games on young people," Stirling Media Research Institute (2005).

To read this research in its entirety please visit http://tinyurl.com/lt9fs.

"Most research on electronic play has focused on its possible negative effects for children and adolescents, and contextual factors such as socioeconomic status and culture are rarely considered…. The study explains how electronic games may also have potential benefits for young players that include providing children with the opportunity to negotiate society's rules and roles, allowing children to experiment with aggression in a safe setting without real world consequences, and facilitating children's development of self-regulation arousal."

— Dorothy E. Salonius-Pasternak, "The next level of research on electronic play: Potential benefits and contextual influences for children and adolescents," Human Technology (2005), pp. 1, 5-22.

To read this research in its entirety please visit http://tinyurl.com/ov9km.

"[There is] no support for links between computer game playing and aggressive feelings, thoughts or behavior although these outcomes are well studied…. [This] review gives strong support for computer game playing having positive effects on spatial abilities and reaction time. Spatial abilities are traditionally considered one of the most important parts of our intelligence."

— A. Lager & S. Brenberg, " Health Effects of Video and Computer Game Playing — A Systemic Review of Scientific Studies," National Swedish Public Health Institute (2005).

To read this research in its entirety please visit http://tinyurl.com/6da838.

"The research on video games and crime is compelling to read. But it just doesn't hold up. Kids have been getting less violent since those games came out. That includes gun violence and every other sort of violence that might be inspired by a video game."

— Helen Smith, forensic psychologist, youth violence specialist and author, quoted in Gerard Jones' book Killing Monsters (2002).

To learn more about this book and its author please visit www.gerardjones.com.

"It's time to move beyond blanket condemnations and frightening anecdotes and focus on developing targeted educational and policy interventions based on solid data. As with the entertainment of earlier generations, we may look back on some of today's games with nostalgia, and our grandchildren may wonder what the fuss was about."

— Cheryl Olson, "Media Violence Research and Youth Violence Data: Why do They Conflict?", Academic Psychiatry, 28:2, Summer, 2004.

To read this research in its entirety please visit http://tinyurl.com/9km2j.

"It is very difficult to establish a link between the use of violent video games and real world acts of violence. This is because there are so many other variables which have not been controlled for in previous research -- these include social factors such as drugs, alcohol, mental illness, access to guns, and so on…. I think that directly linking video games to school shootings is overlooking other important factors -- such as mental illness or psychopathy in those who commit the crimes as well as access to guns."

— Dr Guy Porter, Clinical Researcher, Discipline of Psychological Medicine, University of Sydney, Australia quoted in a 2008 interview.

Ratings System Helps Parents and Kids Make Responsible, Age-Appropriate Choices

Just as with other types of entertainment, there is a wide variety of content available in computer and video games to suit the wide variety of individuals who play games. In order to ensure in appropriate games do not make it into children’s hands, computer and video games are rated by the Entertainment and Software Rating Board (ESRB). This system gives both descriptions of content and age recommendations. In 2007, 45% of all games sold were rated "E" (for "Everyone"); 28% were rated "T" (for "Teen"); 16% were rated "M" (for "Mature"), and 12% were rated "E10+" (for "Everyone 10+").

The industry has also voluntarily established numerous tools and policies to help parents make educated choices and ensure that retailers only sell games to those whose age is appropriate for the game in question. For example, it is currently working with Governors and Attorneys General across the nation to spread the word further about the ESRB rating system. And the latest Federal Trade Commission report shows these efforts are paying off. Today, over 80% of parents are aware of the ESRB ratings system and over 70% of parents use the system in making buying decisions.

Entertainment Software Association (2009). Industry Facts. Retrieved June 12, 2009, from

http://www.theesa.com/index.asp

by Henry Jenkins-MIT Professor

1. The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence.

According to federal crime statistics, the rate of juvenile violent crime in the United States is at a 30-year low. Researchers find that people serving time for violent crimes typically consume less media before committing their crimes than the average person in the general population. It's true that young offenders who have committed school shootings in America have also been game players. But young people in general are more likely to be gamers — 90 percent of boys and 40 percent of girls play. The overwhelming majority of kids who play do NOT commit antisocial acts. According to a 2001 U.S. Surgeon General's report, the strongest risk factors for school shootings centered on mental stability and the quality of home life, not media exposure. The moral panic over violent video games is doubly harmful. It has led adult authorities to be more suspicious and hostile to many kids who already feel cut off from the system. It also misdirects energy away from eliminating the actual causes of youth violence and allows problems to continue to fester.

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

Claims like this are based on the work of researchers who represent one relatively narrow school of research, "media effects." This research includes some 300 studies of media violence. But most of those studies are inconclusive and many have been criticized on methodological grounds. In these studies, media images are removed from any narrative context. Subjects are asked to engage with content that they would not normally consume and may not understand. Finally, the laboratory context is radically different from the environments where games would normally be played. Most studies found a correlation, not a causal relationship, which means the research could simply show that aggressive people like aggressive entertainment. That's why the vague term "links" is used here. If there is a consensus emerging around this research, it is that violent video games may be one risk factor - when coupled with other more immediate, real-world influences — which can contribute to anti-social behavior. But no research has found that video games are a primary factor or that violent video game play could turn an otherwise normal person into a killer.

3. Children are the primary market for video games.

While most American kids do play video games, the center of the video game market has shifted older as the first generation of gamers continues to play into adulthood. Already 62 percent of the console market and 66 percent of the PC market is age 18 or older. The game industry caters to adult tastes. Meanwhile, a sizable number of parents ignore game ratings because they assume that games are for kids. One quarter of children ages 11 to 16 identify an M-Rated (Mature Content) game as among their favorites. Clearly, more should be done to restrict advertising and marketing that targets young consumers with mature content, and to educate parents about the media choices they are facing. But parents need to share some of the responsibility for making decisions about what is appropriate for their children. The news on this front is not all bad. The Federal Trade Commission has found that 83 percent of game purchases for underage consumers are made by parents or by parents and children together.

4. Almost no girls play computer games.

Historically, the video game market has been predominantly male. However, the percentage of women playing games has steadily increased over the past decade. Women now slightly outnumber men playing Web-based games. Spurred by the belief that games were an important gateway into other kinds of digital literacy, efforts were made in the mid-90s to build games that appealed to girls. More recent games such as The Sims were huge crossover successes that attracted many women who had never played games before. Given the historic imbalance in the game market (and among people working inside the game industry), the presence of sexist stereotyping in games is hardly surprising. Yet it's also important to note that female game characters are often portrayed as powerful and independent. In his book Killing Monsters, Gerard Jones argues that young girls often build upon these representations of strong women warriors as a means of building up their self confidence in confronting challenges in their everyday lives.

5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

Former military psychologist and moral reformer David Grossman argues that because the military uses games in training (including, he claims, training soldiers to shoot and kill), the generation of young people who play such games are similarly being brutalized and conditioned to be aggressive in their everyday social interactions.

Grossman's model only works if:

* we remove training and education from a meaningful cultural context.

* we assume learners have no conscious goals and that they show no resistance to what they are being taught.

* we assume that they unwittingly apply what they learn in a fantasy environment to real world spaces.

The military uses games as part of a specific curriculum, with clearly defined goals, in a context where students actively want to learn and have a need for the information being transmitted. There are consequences for not mastering those skills. That being said, a growing body of research does suggest that games can enhance learning. In his recent book, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, James Gee describes game players as active problem solvers who do not see mistakes as errors, but as opportunities for improvement. Players search for newer, better solutions to problems and challenges, he says. And they are encouraged to constantly form and test hypotheses. This research points to a fundamentally different model of how and what players learn from games.

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

On April 19, 2002, U.S. District Judge Stephen N. Limbaugh Sr. ruled that video games do not convey ideas and thus enjoy no constitutional protection. As evidence, Saint Louis County presented the judge with videotaped excerpts from four games, all within a narrow range of genres, and all the subject of previous controversy. Overturning a similar decision in Indianapolis, Federal Court of Appeals Judge Richard Posner noted: "Violence has always been and remains a central interest of humankind and a recurrent, even obsessive theme of culture both high and low. It engages the interest of children from an early age, as anyone familiar with the classic fairy tales collected by Grimm, Andersen, and Perrault are aware." Posner adds, "To shield children right up to the age of 18 from exposure to violent descriptions and images would not only be quixotic, but deforming; it would leave them unequipped to cope with the world as we know it." Many early games were little more than shooting galleries where players were encouraged to blast everything that moved. Many current games are designed to be ethical testing grounds. They allow players to navigate an expansive and open-ended world, make their own choices and witness their consequences. The Sims designer Will Wright argues that games are perhaps the only medium that allows us to experience guilt over the actions of fictional characters. In a movie, one can always pull back and condemn the character or the artist when they cross certain social boundaries. But in playing a game, we choose what happens to the characters. In the right circumstances, we can be encouraged to examine our own values by seeing how we behave within virtual space.

7. Video game play is socially isolating.

Much video game play is social. Almost 60 percent of frequent gamers play with friends. Thirty-three percent play with siblings and 25 percent play with spouses or parents. Even games designed for single players are often played socially, with one person giving advice to another holding a joystick. A growing number of games are designed for multiple players — for either cooperative play in the same space or online play with distributed players. Sociologist Talmadge Wright has logged many hours observing online communities interact with and react to violent video games, concluding that meta-gaming (conversation about game content) provides a context for thinking about rules and rule-breaking. In this way there are really two games taking place simultaneously: one, the explicit conflict and combat on the screen; the other, the implicit cooperation and comradeship between the players. Two players may be fighting to death on screen and growing closer as friends off screen. Social expectations are reaffirmed through the social contract governing play, even as they are symbolically cast aside within the transgressive fantasies represented onscreen.

8. Video game play is desensitizing.

Classic studies of play behavior among primates suggest that apes make basic distinctions between play fighting and actual combat. In some circumstances, they seem to take pleasure wrestling and tousling with each other. In others, they might rip each other apart in mortal combat. Game designer and play theorist Eric Zimmerman describes the ways we understand play as distinctive from reality as entering the "magic circle." The same action — say, sweeping a floor — may take on different meanings in play (as in playing house) than in reality (housework). Play allows kids to express feelings and impulses that have to be carefully held in check in their real-world interactions. Media reformers argue that playing violent video games can cause a lack of empathy for real-world victims. Yet, a child who responds to a video game the same way he or she responds to a real-world tragedy could be showing symptoms of being severely emotionally disturbed. Here's where the media effects research, which often uses punching rubber dolls as a marker of real-world aggression, becomes problematic. The kid who is punching a toy designed for this purpose is still within the "magic circle" of play and understands her actions on those terms. Such research shows us only that violent play leads to more violent play.

Jenkins, H. (2009). Reality Bytes: Eight Myths About Video Games Debunked. Retrieved June 12, 2009, from

http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolution/impact/myths.html