Comment by tseabrooks | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tseabrooks | Hacker News Reader

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Anecdotal evidence:

I've owned every video game console made in the last 15 years or so (While I was growing up). I had a TV in my own room and my own computer with broadband as soon as it was available in our city. I skipped classes to play video games in high school. I played video games into the wee hours of the night for all of high school and college. I've seen all the latest movies and TV shows and enjoy critiquing them with friends.

On the flip side, I have some 20 or so boxes of books I've completely read... I average maybe 2 books a week and have done so since I was old enough to find what I wanted at the library. I read faster than anyone I know. I read books from all genres for fun, and always have. I managed to do well in college which got me into grad school with a stipend.

The point: anecdotal evidence is not very useful. Also, the article and your comment seem to take a very naive view of human development. There is a lot more to this than just "video games made my son stupid".

I had a computer or some other electronic gadget since I was 7. I also played insane amounts of computer games (sometimes they had to take away computer from me).

But just like you I read insanely a lot - I had whole school library read by the time I was 10 - literary everything. When I had reading streaks I'd just pack my schoolbag chock full of books and bring them back in 2 weeks (I read the whole LOTR trilogy in 2 days! when I was 12!!!).

Computer games only gave me the chance for greater immersion. I also learned English all by myself just through trying to hack the computer and by playing games.

How it all came to be? Our home was full of books. My parents both read a lot (newspapers, novels, poetry...) and they were both formally uneducated. I also "inherited" boxes of 80's pop-tech magazines form my older brother and lots of novels from various people. My parents always showed that they were proud of me for reading a lot. I was also lucky that the dude who stocked me with games (pirated I must say!) had excellent taste - so I started my gaming career with Ultima Underworld 2 (not knowing English at the time), Colonization, TIE fighter,...

So if somebody were asking me for advice - I'd say: 1. Stock your home with loads of quality literature. 2. Commend your kids on reading. 3. Your kids WILL play games (else nowadays they will be considered dorks) - so you better stock some quality video games (RPG and strategy if possible). 4. Do not own a TV!

There.

"The point: anecdotal evidence is not very useful."

Indeed, I'm not arguing that, I just wanted to share my anecdote because it was relevant to the article.

"Also, the article and your comment seem to take a very naive view of human development. There is a lot more to this than just "video games made my son stupid"."

Sorry if it sounds that way, I didn't want to imply that (though my father does believe it). I'm pretty sure there are lots of people that played video games a lot and turned out well.

Also, all I have to show for it is an improved reading ability, I don't think it made me smarter or anything(1). I'm extremely bad at personal interactions, communications and other stuff, which is why I'm still programming and not in a managerial position.

I will try out doing a startup on my own, but I doubt I'd climb the career ladder in a "traditional" way - I'm always being overtaken by the arrogant, self-confident, usually way less technically capable people-talkers on the way up, at least on the big corporate environments I've worked in (finance and insurance).

(1)Edit: see these two other posts by maxawaytoolong and awakeasleep which seem to agree on it not being that useful:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1724089

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1724269

>I'm pretty sure there are lots of people that played video games a lot and turned out well.

Not only that, there are lots of people who had access to video games restricted and ended up worse off for it.

anecdotal evidence is not very useful.

Which is probably why the article mentioned a study that examined the link between access to video games and academic performance?

Sorry, I was mostly referring to the parent comment and not the article. Inreference, to the article though... The bit about the study doesn't really have much meat.

"Boys with video games at home, he found, spend more time playing them than reading, and their academic performance suffers substantially. Hard to believe, isn't it, but Science has spoken."

There is a lot left unexplored here. Was the problem the video games or the fact that they didn't read? Reading vs playing video games is a false dichotomy. They aren't mutually exclusive and the problem probably just indicates parents aren't taking an active roll and doing the sorts of things other commenters are suggesting.

I had a very similar experience. Video games were not allowed in my house, but my neighborhood friend had 4 different consoles and tons of games. Many an evening was spent playing nintendo; my parents joked about my friend's family adopting me because I was over there constantly. I turned out just fine, and said friend scored a perfect 1600 on his SATs.

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