A new study from the University of Oxford has found that “time spent playing video games is unlikely to impact wellbeing.” The study involved 39,000 gamers playing games like Apex Legends and The Crew 2. The study was published in the Royal Society Open Science journal, and there’s an overview on the University of Oxford site, written by the study’s authors, which explains that the study finds there is “little evidence for causal connection between wellbeing and video game playing.” A new Oxford study has determined that playing video games is “unlikely to impact wellbeing.””The study found ‘little to no evidence for a causal connection between gameplay and well-being’ but that ‘motivations play a role in players’ well-being,'” we’re told. The study used the data gathered from players of seven games, including Apex Legends, The Crew 2, Gran Turismo Sport, Forza Horizon 4, Eve Online, Outriders, and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, over six weeks. As pointed out by BBC news, these results would seem to go against an earlier study that found playing video games can contribute to positive wellbeing. “This exciting study brings together significant amounts of real playing data collected by games companies and donated by players. Our work reliably measures how long people are playing these games across time, data which simply wasn’t accessible in the past,” says Professor Andrew K. Przybylski, a senior research fellow at Oxford Internet Institute, who also worked on that earlier study. “Our study finds little to no evidence of connections between gameplay and well-being, but we know we need much more player data from many more platforms to develop the kind of deeper understanding required to inform policy and shape advice to parents and medical professionals.” Researcher and co-author Dr Matti Vuorre adds, “One thing is certain – right now there is not enough data and evidence for policymakers and regulators to be developing laws and rules to restrict gameplay among certain groups in a population. I would urge all online platforms, not just games companies, to make it easy for users to donate their data to independent scholars.” Przybylski expands on this, adding, “This work represents substantial progress for the field but we need to cast a much wider net. If we want to truly understand how games influence human health we have to collect data from the thousands of games played every day. Conclusive answers to the questions of how games influence our society will require all of the major console, computer, and mobile platforms to empower their users to effortlessly and ethically donate their play data for independent analysis.”What do you think of the results of this study? Let us know in the comments!
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