A new study has confirmed but we knew all along: people who play videogames are better at academics than non-players.
The researchers analyzed the data from more than 12,000 high school students in Australia and found that those who played online videogames almost daily scored 15 points above average in math and reading tests and 17 points above average in science.
Scientifically speaking, the study only found a correlation between academic performance and playing videogames but it didn't prove that one of them leads to the other. Simply put, the results may mean that playing videogames leads to better academic performance but it might as well mean that people who perform well academically tend to reward themselves by playing videogames or that there is an external factor (for example: parents' education level) that helps some people perform better in school and play videogames.
The research was conducted by Alberto Posso from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. He believes that it is reasonable to expect videogames to boost academic performance. "When you play online games you’re solving puzzles to move to the next level and that involves using some of the general knowledge and skills in maths, reading and science that you’ve been taught during the day" he argued.
The study also investigated the relationship between social media and academic performance, concluding that users of sites such as Facebook and Twitter were more likely to score 4% lower on average and that the more frequent the social network usage went, the lower the scores.
The study was published in the International Journal of Communication.
