Study: Video games affect studying time; Us: *gasp*

^ LOL! So true!

I actually attend the University of Western Ontario, and just took a break to browse Joystiq when I should be studying for a Calc quiz. Coincidence?

Dude, I know you aren't trying to justify this. There is 24 hrs in a day, anytime spent doing one this is going to take away from the time that can be spent doing something else. How the hell do you need science to figure that out?

Well, firstly by explaining that your belief is wrong. There are other axes along which studies found that, as students spent more time, their grades improved or were unaffected. For example, employment:

http://www.acui.org/content.aspx?menu_id=122&id=2170

I repeat, the duty of science is to test hypotheses, not rely on assumptions.

Hey David, if I stare at a wall (brick or not) for 8 hours a day, how would that effect my studying? Maybe they should do a study about that and compare it to the playing video games. I wonder which one would make my grades drop more.
My money's on the wall.
Doing a study on the obvious is NOT science.
Should they do a study on what would happen if a subject stopped drinking and eating anything?
What would happen?
100% of the time, the subject would die.

I replied to your response a few post down, what I said was


"What I said is not a belief, its the obvious and factual. Now in this particular situation we are talking about limited resources(time), and if I use more of those resources doing something else(playing videogames) then thats less resources that are now available to actually study"

He's right. It may seem obvious, but there are a lot of instances where the "common sense" answer is not necessarily accurate.

This isn't about whether or not playing video games "spends" time. Obviously, anything you do will "spend" time. It's whether or not playing videogames is correlated with more or less time studying, and better or worse grades. As with all correlational studies, it is not necessarily causal (I should also note that this studies people who's ROOMMATES brought game machines to college their Freshman year, and not the game machine owners themselves. It'd be interesting to see if this affect only occurs to the unsuspecting, typically non-game playing roommate, or also with the game machine owner himself).

People that are saying this is really stupid and "obvious" are not thinking about this correctly. Yes, there are 24 hours in a day, but the amount of time people study is typically far less than this. Say the average student studies 3 hours a day (outside class). So, according to this study, students that play videogames would average 2:20 hours a day of study.

You could do another study that looked at (as someone else did) how much someone reads, and correlate that with how much studying they do.

The point is, there are plenty of things that can be done in a day, some which might affect how much you study and others which may not. Just because you do something OTHER than study doesn't necessarily mean that it would reduce your normal amount of "studying".

That being said, the Diablo II expansion did cause me to actually abandon an "Independent Study" I was doing in College. Totally worth it.

-Jeff
http://alinktothefuture.com

Agreed! It seems to me that for every year that goes by in this new millennium, the general public gets dumber and dumber. "Duh, it's Samsonite! I was way off."

yarly

NO WAI!

Just...gold.

LMAO

Yeah, I remember in high school if I got bored, I would just sit and stare out the window the rest of the class. The days when it was raining was the best, because you could watch the rain hit the roof and make little concentric circles with the ripples. But I still listened to my teacher because he was a good guy, just got a little boring some days.

replying to David a few posts up

Oh crap, same here. I have a test on Friday...Good point.

what the hell is wrong with the reply button

Me too. Hey what's this, Joystiq and Picross?

::games for 36 hours, dies::

Same thing here. I seem to hardly play games as much as a read about them anymore. Like you said, it's far to easy to say, Well, let's check Joystiq for a few minutes... every few minutes.

QFT

Also, when speaking of correlations only statistics are needed. When speaking of causation, the exception disproves the rule. The fact that many gamers do exceedingly well in school prevents a causal relationship.