Addictive Gaming

While I do agree that the addictive nature of certain video games are a cause for concern (WoW, I'm looking in your direction), I believe that time and money would better be spent on educating people on how to better manage their time. Personally, I think its pretty obvious that the more time you sink on something not related to schoolwork, the worse you will do on tests and projects. If you have not experienced this before, then you are a better student than I.

I also found it very interesting that in the study of Time Management on Video Game Usage and Academic Performance Markers, students who spent around 4 hours gaming a day, did better on the Math section of the SAT than the majority of people who spent very little time gaming. Ironically, there was also a person who scored a 700 on the math section while playing 9 hours a day, which was higher than all of the samples who played no games except for one. This just shows that, like most other things in this world, results vary depending on the individual and, as such, studies like this one should not be taken as the absolute truth.

As for games being addictive, if you have ever actually played an addictive game, I can almost guarantee you will know it, either through your own realization or your friends asking why they never see you anymore. After that, what you decide to do is entirely your own choice. Knowing that something is addictive will do little if you do not decide to do anything about it. Rather than stopping cold turkey, it would be better to help the person realize the benefits of restructuring their life. I know many people older than myself and professionals in the working world, who play addictive games like World of Warcraft, but still manage to work their jobs and earn a fair amount of money while doing it. The ability to manage your time is, in my opinion, far more valuable, in both school and the working world, than knowing that what you are doing is addictive and may have an effect on your academic performance. (And yes, I did read the section at the end of the study where the author mentioned much of this. I agree with most of what he says, but the whole study seemed kind of pointless to me.)