Video Gamers at the End of History

Every year or so, the video game industry releases its latest demographics on its audience. And every year the big news is that the video game player is growing older (this year's result: 35). This is good news for the video game industry, which conveniently sponsors the study, eager for an older and richer consumer. However, the industry will be much less happy with the results of a recent study from the Center for Disease Control. It turns out that video gamers are not only growing older, but they are also, as MSNBC glossed the findings, "fat and bummed." U. S. News and World Report put it a bit more diplomatically: video game players "are 35-year-old adults, many of whom are overweight, socially introverted and possibly depressed." The findings, to be published in the October issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine but trumpeted widely to the media this month, were greeted with dismay by overweight, bummed-out video gamers across the country. As if these folks need any more reasons to lock themselves away with a family-size bag of Fritos and Ghost Busters: The Video Game.

There are of course good reasons to question the study's findings. For one thing, the sample was exclusively drawn from western Washington state, where "fat" and "bummed" figure as key terms in many personal ads and promotional brochures. And, of course, the difference between the percentage of depressives and plus-sizers among the video game population in the study's pool doesn't exactly blow out of the water the numbers found in the general population.

Still, unlike most of my fellow video gamers, I am inclined to accept the study's findings. Taking my own highly scientific survey of my immediate cluster of video gaming family members, I come up with an average age of 34.8, about 60% of whom are at least moderately overweight and 80% of whom are pretty well off their rockers (although scoring higher in the study's "neuroticism" and "psychoticism" demographics than we do with "depression"--but with .2 years still to go, there is still a chance we will make it). But I, for one, take a certain degree of pride in these findings. After all, there is a long tradition in this country of chubby, mentally-ill pioneers in narrative media extending back over two centuries, and I am delighted to learn that I am a part of that history.

New narrative media have long posed an attraction for a certain type, it seems. A little more than two centuries ago, the new kid on the narrative media block was the novel, which had the disastrous capability of transporting its readers to far-off lands and inflaming imaginations with passionate thoughts. Almost immediately, the phenomenon sparked widespread concerns and studies of the "effects of novel reading" and especially for the growing number of addicts. These readers were prone to become disconnected from reality, isolated, and ultimately lonely old maids or tobacco-stained bachelors.

A century later, when film was new and novels had gone legit, anxious scholars examined "the physiological and psychological effect of habitual attendance at the movies." Here's one from 1921:

American movie fans are constantly stimulated artificially. Their tear ducts and adrenal glands are overtaxed. They are emotionally sapped night after night before unreal circumstances. This means that their capacity for reacting emotionally in real life is reduced. The tendency is toward emotional insanity, a complete inability to feel any emotion which is not artificially stimulated.

And so, we fast-forward a century and discover that once again our addiction to the new narrative media of video games is making us physiologically and psychologically damaged goods, old toothless crones whose best hope is that when we die alone, as surely we must, the neighbors will find our body before the dogs.

But once we are all gone--all the novel readers, film junkies, and compulsive gamers--once our gene pool has been scourged from the earth, who will be left? Given that we are clearly heading toward extinction, maybe it is time the CDC and others began studying the mental and physical health of those who have never been tempted to immerse themselves in "artificial" worlds, whose "tear ducts and adrenal glands" have remained blissfully dormant. Fit, trim, rational folks--presumably the kind of people who can see the world in a way the rest of us are too fat and bummed to see.

Looking back in history for examples, we could point to Thomas Jefferson, whose dislike of novels helped him maintain the mental clarity necessary to enslave the mother of his children (and, of course, the children themselves) and to defend the French Revolution even after the Reign of Terror. Or in our own day, we could look to Senator Joseph Lieberman, who has made a career out of bemoaning the effects of video games on our society, even as he has demonstrated his "independent thinking" by being one of the Senate's most stalwart defenders of the invasion of Iraq as a meaningful and logical response to the attacks of 9/11.

Like the authors of the CDC study I want to offer a caveat: I am not saying that the failure to play video games, read novels, or go to the movies will turn you into a self-justifying hypocrite, war monger or slave owner. Further research is obviously called for. However, to quote from the CDC study, "the data reveal important patterns ... for future research." In the meantime, I am off to fire up my X-Box. The thought of the world I will be leaving behind has left me bummed. And hungry.

Comments

[davism97]

Wikipedia states that around 64% of the general U.S. adult population is overweight. This would seem to imply that video game usage has no correlation with weight gain (unless we further assume that the general U.S. adult population are all gamers).

[swingvote1]

as a married 40 year old father of five kids i can say that after a hard days work a few games of madden football 2010 on my 64 inch digital tv is much cheaper than going to giants stadium , or hanging out with a bunch of work friends at applebees having rib tips talking about work ,or going to a strip club to give money to women who dont look as good as my wife,,, i rather sit in my home with my family and play wii bowling as a family open a bag of pretzels and connect with my kids ...
how cool it would it have if my dad played dig dug with me or frogger no doubt we would have been closer .... so to recap 40 employed 5 kids wife happy 12-7 record online.......

[CroatianCritter]

I am a 35 year old gamer who is AVERAGE weight (165 lbs). With the film industry in turmoil (ENDLESS SEQUELS AND BRAINDEAD DIRECTORS) and the music industry struggling (MUSIC NEEDS THE SAME REVOLUTION THAT OCCURRED DURING THE EARLY 90S), much of our artistic talent has relocated into the video game industry. With minimal legislation and the ability to be creative without filters, the video game industry has entered a golden age. Over the past five years, such wonderful games as Bioshock, Halo 2 & 3, Mass Effect, the Metal Gear series, and the Fable series have been incredibly innovative. Plus, the independent scene has taken off with the success of small titles on XBox Arcade like Shadow Complex and Castle Crashers. Right now, this industry is where the "smart people" are. Like all entertainment mediums, video games will have their controversy but as a soon to be middle age gamer, I try to dedicate a few hours a week to playing the newest, freshest game. Sometimes, I can also put in 5-7 hours in a day if I am properly intrigued. Thank you gaming industry!

P.S. Gaming has also helped my creative writing. I feel a lot more open in expressing myself and it has helped garner my mind some fresh new ideas.

[Jared Gardner - Huffpost Blogger]

Beautifully put. All the more vital that the smart, creative people have a place to work now that the "second golden age" of TV is coming to an end, hastened by the last writer's strike.

[ConfuciusSay-]

I've been playing games since Pong came out. I'm not fat. Or unfit.

[joe2143]

man, let me tell you it is sure tough getting up the stairs after playing video games for 15 years. my 5-10, 155lb body can barely take the stress

[CanuckInLyon]

Gee, it's all such bad news for my son, who is now 17 and has been happily playing video games for a decade. Along with many of his friends. And last time I looked, he seemd pretty thin. But I guess the exceptions don't make the rule for this author who has an obvious axe to grind.

[rbtboss]

Well as long as reading comprehension skills are not sacrificed.

[Jared Gardner - Huffpost Blogger]

ouch!

[robbyJ]

You know why they are bummed? Because games now suck. Same thing that happened to the car industry, is now happening to the video game industry. Games and cars started simple you have your model T and your Pac Man. A lot of time passes and you get your muscle cars and your good games like Zelda, Tribes 2, Socom 2. They were awesome cars and awesome games, and everything went down hill from there. Now we have the signs of the times, like the Prius and the Wii remote. Games are getting lighter, more innovative and cost effective, but less fun.

I love this metaphor. VWs are just like WOW, you have to keep paying and paying.

I think the technology is there, game developers like car developers just stopped caring about fun, and now care about market share and product viability.

The fat geek stereo type isn't serving your point. It's just like the chicken or the egg argument. Are they fat because they played video games their whole life, or have they played video games their whole life, because they are fat. I would have to say your statistics indicate the latter.

[CynAnne]

Heehee, Jared..please pass the pretzels, and hand me a controller..! ;) ...

[Jaybot]

Real gamers eat Cheetos, just make sure you get the black controller.

[CynAnne]

Ohhh gawd, Jaybot..remembering the horror of taking off the shell of my beloved Gamecube controller that I had let my son borrow for several months (should known better..lol), and having to clean out the cheesy-chip 'schmutz' he had ground down into the control buttons..Arrrgh! *shudders* ;) ...

[mbmclaughlin]

This just in: New study confirms that American workers in the oil refining industry are more likely to speak with a southern accent and be Southern Baptists than the average.

[snoopbuzz]

I would much rather have someone take their agression out on a video game than out on the streets.

[TheBaffler]

Isn't it likely that socially introverted people are more likely to be drawn to something so solitary (multi-party games aside) as gaming, rather than games turning people into social introverts? There were plenty of introverts before there were video games. They simply did other solitary things, like read books, before games came along.

[snoopbuzz]

I have noticed, in playing a MMORPG, that many of the people I have contact with in the game are extroverted, married, have a job, around my age since I will say things that people of my generation would know but not any other. Whenever I talk with somebody that displays introverted type behavior I find thatthey are not married, work at a fast food type place, not interested in what anybody has to say and has to have things just right otherwise they have a fit. Just what I have observed.

[TheBaffler]

I also know many gamer who are extroverts, but don't at all agree with you that introverts losers. Some are no doubt maladjusted jerks, but it's extreme to say most are like that. In fact, it's my observation that most introverts are intelligent, decent people who are simply uncomfortable in many social situations.

[jsgaetano]

It's literally true that being a conservative is more indicative of mental illness than being a video gamer.

[iblogleft]

Maybe we should include CEO average weight, age, race, and happiness...

[Jaywalkker]

The CDC study sort of begs the familiar question, "does TV make one violent or are people with violent tendencies drawn to violent TV?" I don't think video games actually sap our emotions or indirectly make us depressed, they are just another insular device or distraction for people who already feel that way. If it weren't the videogames it'd be the MP3 player, hundreds of cable channels, piles of books, millions of tracks of HO scale model railroads in the basement, Internet, MMORPGs, alcoholism, gambling, drugs, etc etc.

My only concern about gamers getting older, is the loss of youth oriented games. The platform game is going extinct. I miss playing RayMan, Oddworld, and Mario/Sonic variants. I had hope for new themes like VooDoo Vince, SpongeBob and Jak and Daxter which were fun, to take root, but no. Everything is a first person shooter or "gritty" non-linear world like Dead Rising and GTA. What will my daughter grow up playing?

[kendraro]

I love my gamers! (ages 12 and 38) - and I notice that every male that steps foot in the house is interested on some level - from the also avid to the "show me how."