Link (blogspot.com) (http://soulsphincter.blogspot.com/2007/12/youth-and-network-cultures-between.html)

Youth and Network Cultures: Between Moral Panic and Techno Romantic

The Swedish organisation Ungdomsstyrelsen (The Youth Foundation) has just released a report (totally in Swedish) into young people and computer games. Entitled Unga och nätverkskulturer – mellan moralpanik och teknikromantik (Youth and Network Cultures: Between Moral Panic and Techno Romantic), it looks like it contains many interesting suppositions. A total of 2 900 Swedes between the ages of 16 och 25 answered a series of questions about their computer game play, social habits, health and education. The result from the survey that has been making the news in Sweden since its release is that slightly fewer gamers drink alcohol (19%) than non-gamers (24%) in the age group. There is also found to be less stress and depression among gamers than non-games, although this seems a tentative connection it would be one I, from personal experience would expect. There was also found to be no higher incidence of obesity among gamers as compared to non-gamers. The report can be downloaded from the link. One section of particular interest is "Sharing is Caring" by Jessica Linde och Simon Lindgren which discusses file sharing culture, sub-politics and the new social movements associated with P2P file sharing.

Are computer gamers actually more healthy than other people? Discuss!

The study only deals with gamers between the ages 16 to 25 so I can only give my opinion and guesses.

I believe that games give people an outlet for anti-social behavior and/or stimulate the mind. Some games can even be educational with out being Educational Games. I suspect that a fair and impartial study would find that for every one person whose aggressive/anti-social behavior is reinforced by games that 99 people find it helps them to cope with anger and frustration.

fewer gamers drink alcohol (19%) than non-gamers (24%)

Well of course - it's hard to play a game while holding a beer! Especially considering most gamers use controllers which require both hands.

As for the less stress and less depression, that makes sense too. Gamers enjoy playing games. Doing something you enjoy would likely make you less stressed and less depressed. Different people have different outlets to release stress and depression, and for gamers, their outlet is games. Their are obviously other outlets, but perhaps games are easier to access - you don't have to leave your house, you don't need other people, and it costs you nothing aside from the relatively small monetary investment for the cost of the game.

Well of course - it's hard to play a game while holding a beer! Especially considering most gamers use controllers which require both hands.

Yay for beer hats. :D

Well I usually don't drink while gaming, but in my casual life, well... i do... a lot. It's still less compared to the average Belgian beer swellers, who don't play since most consider it a lesser form of entertainment.

Gamers can be counted with the more 'relaxed' part of society, though some I think are extreme drinkers.

What country is that anyhow? 20% alcohol consumers between 16 and 25? We will probably reach the complement of that percentage. :eek: But of course beer in Sweden is kind of expensive, as in REAL expensive. Simple explanation would be that to cut the costs of gaming, one must cut on the drinking. A sacrifice I guess?

Well of course - it's hard to play a game while holding a beer! Especially considering most gamers use controllers which require both hands.

Besides, your gaming skills go down a drain too. I don't know many people who game to get pwned ;)

...but we're known for our violent tendencies for playing all those ultra-violent games and getting influences and ideas... :rolleyes:

...of course alcohol and violence have nothing at all to do with each other... :holy:

Less alcohol because of less partying. Less stress because games are immersive and can make you forget the whole world while you're playing. Also, if it doesn't work out in real life, in games you can still be a champion, a king, a ruler, a hero.

Besides, computer games are geeky. It doesn't lie in the nature of a geek to engage in pointless, brutal violence. Exceptions happen. Some people will grab the gun and empty the load in a school, but that's people with problems from the beginning.

It's good to see some people realising gaming isn't the sole reason some youth are violent. And as for game being educational, I can honnestly say games like, the legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy, and especially Baldur's Gate 2 improved my english. I remember time when I'd actually looked up word in a english dictionnary while playing BG2 so I could really understand what an NPC was saying. (Granted, BG2 isn't really displaying difficult english, but for a 14 years old with minimal exposure to english it can be tricky :P)

In all, I'm glad people start to realise gaming can be an healthy thing. Sure abuse can occur and the current trend in gaming is realesing mindless WWII / X war game with slightly better graphic. And I do question the taste and point of such games. But I ask what's the difference in immersing yourself in middle earth while reading LOTR or immersing yourself in Fearûn while playing Baldur's Gate? Isn't the same? Providing an escape from real life?

I can honnestly say games like, the legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy, and especially Baldur's Gate 2 improved my english.
I know what you mean. Ultima Underworld taught me English, never mind improving it. My brother and I sat there with an English->French dictionary and had to look up almost every single word. I was 11 at the time, and on top of that UW's English was not easy ;)

I agree entirely with Nakia, Aldeth and chev. It's good to see actual statistics that support what most of us gamers have known for a long time (namely that, as Nakia and chev have pointed out, violent gamers are the exception and not the rule). I'd like to think it will make other people more aware that gamers as a rule are NOT raving lunatics intent on murdering everyone around them. Gamers have been stereotyped since the late 80s, if not earlier. I'd like to think this survey (and others that have been mentioned here over the years) will help gamers break out of that stereptype.

Yeah, but the tradeoff for less stress and less alcohol consumption is worse eyesight and a slouching posture.

I drink about a beer per day in general while at the computer so heh; I'm one of those 19% then. ;)

I can remember trying to play Unreal Tournament after smoking a couple joints with my brother (a long time ago, mind you). I totally sucked...

Ziad, I think you could find a group of gamers with prevalent aggressive tendencies, but that will be unsupervised shooter kiddies who think they can talk bad to elders. Anything can go wrong when overdone and unsupervised.

Ziad, I think you could find a group of gamers with prevalent aggressive tendencies, but that will be unsupervised shooter kiddies who think they can talk bad to elders. Anything can go wrong when overdone and unsupervised.
of course. There will be a subset of gamers who will become even more aggressive after playing violent games. However as you have pointed out these people were probably already aggressive to begin with, and as said in my earlier post I'm convinced they are only a minority of gamers. My belief is that violent people are attracted by violent video games, not that the games make otherwise normal people violent. I'm not sure the issue is with age, but more to do with a certain mentality about what's acceptable and what's not. However the majority of this aggressive behaviour does seem to come from young male teens, so I may be wrong here.

However, I do think that violent games will make people violent if the people we talk about are impressionable children. Occasionally they might perhaps develop a new taste in violence, but I'm guessing that would happen if they were left unsupervised. That's why I'm in favour of enforcing age ratings at least when it comes to buying the game or being allowed to play it at school or in a cyber cafe or similar. I definitely oppose notions to make games available to any age regardless of sexual or violent content.