Keywords

1 Introduction

Video games are a type of electronic entertainment that has grown larger in businesses over the years, attracting diverse audiences of different ages, races, and genders. Video games are played on multiple devices such as consoles, computers, and smartphones. Each year, the video game industry increasingly sells more video games with over $24.5 billion dollars in sales for 2016 [19]. The Entertainment Software Association reports that 67% of homes across America are said to have video gaming consoles [3]. In addition, a study conducted by Pew Research states that 60% of people aged 18 to 29, and 53% of people aged 30 to 49 were said to play video games [6]. Since gaming is widely popular among all age groups all over the world, research has been done on video games to find the impact of video gaming on players [15]. Researchers conducted studies to understand who plays games [9] as well as interactions between those people and games [14]. Popular age groups for game-related research and studies are students of various age levels. While much previous research investigated negative impacts of gaming such as addiction [7, 10], aggression and violence [1, 2, 8], and poor school performance [4, 5, 17, 18], a growing number of research works have explored possibilities to use games to positively influence gamers [11,12,13, 16, 20].

While the answer to whether video games have negative or positive impact on college students’ academic performance and their way of living is yet to be contested and confirmed, the fact that many current studies sometimes show contradictory and inconclusive results in turn hints to us that the more important question—instead of asking whether games have either positive or negative impacts—is to ask how these games affect college students. Moreover, in addition to video games that may or may not have an influence on students, we also need to consider if there are other factors that may influence students’ daily lives and their academic performances. In our study, we explored the effects of video games in order to answer two questions, “How do video games affect upperclassmen students?” and “What other factors impact college students?”

2 Methodology

2.1 Overview

Our investigation took place at the Virginia State University campus in the Spring 2017 and Fall 2017 semesters. Our study sessions spanned two to three months’ time and consisted of two surveys and weekly interviews. We advertised our study using mailing lists and flyers. The advertisement mentioned that (1) we are interested in studying the effect of video games in students’ lives, (2) study participants would be asked to complete a pre-study survey at the beginning of the study and a post-study survey at the end, and (3) randomly selected participants would be asked to participate in weekly interviews and to keep logs of their video game activities.

2.2 Participants

Undergraduate students who completed 30 semester credit hours and graduate students were recruited for the study. This restriction was imposed to recruit students who at least had one year of college experiences. All participants were over 18 years old and received no monetary compensation. A total of 34 participants were initially enrolled in the study. However, two students dropped out in the middle of the study, leaving 32 participants (24 male, 8 female). Participants’ age ranged from 19 to 34.

Among 32 participants, 28 were African American (87.5%) and 4 were Asians/Pacific Islander (12.5%). Twenty-six participants (81.25%) identified English as their first language, three Arabic (9.38%), one French (3.13%), one Fulani (3.13%) and one Twi (3.13%). Yet no one had problems conversing in English.

Twenty-three participants (71.88%) were Computer Science majors. The other 9 participants (28.13%) came from various other academic majors. Seniors made up the largest group with 11 students (34.38%). Both the juniors and graduate students were the second largest with 10 students (31.25%) in each group. Only 1 student (3.13%) was a sophomore at the time of participation.

2.3 Surveys

Pre-survey

After the consent process, the first survey was collected. During the consent process, students were informed that their personally identifiable information would be kept confidential. After the pre-survey data was collected, researchers categorized participants into four gamer types based on the information provided in the pre-study survey. The four gamer types were Hardcore, Intermediate, Casual, and Non-Gamer. Researchers then used the gamer type information to randomly select students who would participate in the interview process.

Post-survey

The post-survey was given out to all the students who completed the first survey including those who were not involved in the interview process. The survey was distributed after the examination periods. The second survey served as a tool for the participants to reflect on the semester thus far, and judge the positive and negative effects that gaming may have had.

2.4 Interviews

To acquire the necessary information needed for the research, we chose 12 participants at random from each of the four categories between the Spring 2017 and Fall 2017 semesters (hardcore gamers, intermediate gamers, casual gamers, and non-gamers). Out of the 12 students who took part in interviews, 8 of the students (6 male, 2 female) successfully completed the full interview process.

Interviews for the selected participants were broken down into weekly interviews with scheduled one-hour sessions. All interviews were recorded with the use of an audio recording device. Questions asked were focused on the college experience which many times shifted to other themes such as other hobbies, time management, and school activities.

Interviewees classified as a hardcore gamer, intermediate gamer or casual gamer, were asked to maintain a digital gaming diary or a daily video game log. Researchers did not require participants to play games, nor did we specify which games to play; participants were asked to follow their usual daily routines and to write down the specifics of gameplay such as the date that each game was played, the title of the game and the duration that the logger played each game.

3 Findings

3.1 Pre-survey Data

The pre-survey included demographic questions as well as a series of Likert scale questions regarding participants’ previous gaming experience. When answering the question “How much do you enjoy playing video games?”, almost half of the students (46.88%) gave a “7” as their enjoyment levels meaning “Very Much.” A cluster of other responses came from the “5,” “6” and “4” (in descending order) creating another total of nearly 46.88%. On the lower end of the scale, there were only a few students (6.25%) who said that they did not like playing games at all. Another question that was included in the survey was “Why do you Play Games?” The highest overall ranking was “Fun” followed by “Relaxation,” then “Competition,” “Personal Challenge” and “Other” reasons.

A few of the other gaming questions that we added were a little more specific in their intent in understanding how constant the time was that participants spent on video games. When asked “How often do you play video games?”, 18.75% played several times a day, 12.5% played at least once a day, 28.13% played several times a week, 12.5% played once a week, 9.38% played several times a month, 12.5% played once a month and 6.25% rarely played.

Furthermore, we wanted to grasp an idea of their social interactions while gaming by asking two questions. The first question was “How often do you play video games with your friends?” Only 6.25% of the participants played several times a day, 3.13% at least once a day, 34.38% several times a week, 12.5% once a week, 12.5% several times a month, 6.25% once a month and 25% rarely play with friends. In this question, participants’ answers showed a shift with more of the students choosing several times a week and rarely. The second question “How often do you play online multiplayer video games?” was asked to consider not only friends but also the strangers that they may encounter while online. Responses for this question showed 9.38% of the participants playing several times a day, 12.5% at least once a day, 18.75% several times a week, 12.5% once a week, 12.5% several times a month and a higher increase to 34.38% who rarely play online multiplayer games.

3.2 Daily Logs

Students participating in the interviews were also asked to keep daily logs. Daily logs were then analyzed to extract individual students’ video gaming patterns such as the total amount spent gaming, time spent gaming per week, time spent gaming in one sitting, time spent gaming during midterms, time spent gaming during fall break, and the number of games played. It is also important to note that one of the students who considered themselves an intermediate gamer, played a greater number of hours than one of the students who considered themselves a hardcore gamer. However, students are classified under their initial gamer types.

Total Amount Spent Gaming

After each of the interviewees’ six-week period of gameplay, the total amount of hours was calculated for each gamer type by time spent during the week and during the weekend as well. “Hardcore Gamers” played for approximately 128 h and 26 min on the week and 102 h and 20 min during the weekend making a total of 230 h and 46 min. The “Intermediate Gamers” played for 93 h and 30 min during the weekday and 65 h during the weekend making a total of 158 h and 30 min. The “Casual Gamers” played for 24 h during the week and 16 h and 20 min on the weekend making a total of 40 h and 20 min. Overall, the trends of gameplay, as in “Hardcore Gamers” playing the most and “Casual Gamers” playing the least, was expected because of how much that they were inclined to play in their survey information. It is also interesting to note that most of the gameplay for all three groups did, in fact, occur during the week versus the weekends.

Time Spent Gaming During Midterms

Data was isolated for two periods of time. The first period was from September 25, 2017, through September 29, 2017. This was the week of midterms for Virginia State University students. I wanted to know how much time would still be spent during this period. When comparing the midterms week numbers with the approximated school week numbers, the results for “Hardcore” and “Intermediate” gamers stayed relatively the same with a small increase of around three minutes. “Casual Gamers,” however, showed a thirty-minute decrease in play.

Time Spent Gaming During Fall Break

The other period of isolated time was from September 30, 2017, through October 4, 2017, which lasted from the first Saturday until the following Wednesday. During this time, the campus was closed and there were no classes in session for students to attend. Compared to “Midterms,” each of the gamer types had an increased amount of gameplay with “Hardcore Gamers” averaging almost 18 h, “Intermediate Gamers” averaging 13 h, and “Casual Gamers” more than doubling their play time with 3 h and 30 min.

3.3 Interviews

In each interview, the goal was to encourage participants to give their own perspectives on different subjects. Gaming remained one of the main subjects while conducting interviews, sometimes circling back from other topics.

Negative Effects

There were codes while reviewing the interviews that impacted these students in a negative way. An example can be found when P-14 talks about his experiences during his freshmen year. He says, “My freshmen year, I was affected by playing games a lot. My grades weren’t going down to Ds or low Cs, I would never let that happen, but I did notice that there would be sometimes where I would forget my homework or didn’t even realize that I had homework because I would be playing Fallout 4 or I would be playing other games.” He was not prompted by a question he began to express this on his own. This code shows that gaming can be an obstacle in terms of schoolwork, but there are also limits or a certain set of standards to which some students hold themselves.

Another quote that expressed negative effects is that of P-01. P-01 on the topic of his organizational skills and getting work done states, “…I plan stuff out. Then the plans go to shit. Then things happen and life goes down. Then I have a day, then I just fly it out and it works out. I don’t know why it works out. I hate that it works out cause if it didn’t work out, then it would force me to do it properly the next time…” He mentions how life happens, which is an unexpected factor. Not to the extent of every assignment, but this is one of many examples where students said that they wait or are doing assignments last minute. In most cases, doing work last minute does not hurt them, but in hindsight, they do realize that they could do better.

Positive Effects

Positive effects were also found. Stress relief was a common consensus among participants. There were a few quotes mentioning learning real-world knowledge while playing. P-06 says, “games help me learn plays. Most males…knock the ways females can think about sports, but honestly playing those video games really helped me know how to move the football.” This is an example mixing stress relief with learning. She uses football as her stress relief. Games were said to be a substitute when football was not in season. She does not know all the plays, but she is able to use games to learn the real-world knowledge. In this way, she would not have to rely on her boyfriend for everything.

Something else mentioned among some gamers was social interaction, enjoying games with others. P-10 says that he likes to connect with people, socializing and building relationships. Video games are a way for him to do that. “…you can meet new friends because you might find somebody that… like[s] the same game [as] you… Like, I’ve met a couple people that love Dragon Ball Z… and then from talking about Dragon Ball Z, we talk about something else so it’s definitely a way to increase friendship using video games as a tool…”

Motivation

A few of the questions asked were based on the motivation of students and their academics. When asked about this, P-15 says, “I’d like to go into [gaming]… That’s one of my main motivations for getting my education in computer science in general.” His response shows that gaming was the reason for his major choice. During the interview process, he would also show different codes and games that he made for his own personal gain.

Not all aspirations led towards games. P-14 found success in his major of hospitality management saying he takes school seriously. He elaborates, “Over the summer when I got my internship, I brought my Xbox with me. When I went home, I left it there because I was like ‘Hey, I need to focus on this and not focus on the game’ … I’m growing up pretty fast…realizing that I don’t really have time anymore.” In other interviews, he shows this by explaining his leadership in being the president of his departmental organization and internships, which now leaves him busier than before. Interesting enough, he was not the only person who felt that way with multiple participants devoting free time to work, school and organizations.

Time Management

Students when asked about their time management, spoke on how much better they were with time than when they were a freshman. P-07 gives an example of his evolving time management skills saying, “I learned I couldn’t do my homework in my room…That was my freshmen year… It was always like ‘Alright, I’ve been doing homework for 30 min. I’ma take an hour break now and play the game’ …It never goes like that… But I got better though. That was a freshmen year problem. When I get assignments [now], I normally go to the lobby.” Video games in his freshmen year were a distraction. Planning time never really worked out in his favor, further delaying time to get things done. He shows that he is proactive by finding more suitable workspaces.

4 Conclusion

The goal of our research was to investigate if video games caused problems in a college student’s life while also taking other influences into consideration. Fun was found to be one of the main reasons why people were to play games. Our study helped us gauge participants’ views on different aspects of gaming. Almost 1/3 of participants (28.13%) played video games several times a week. Throughout the interview process, participants shared with us their views of the video games, how playing the games impacted their day to day lives, and some positive/negative effects of video gaming. As upperclassmen, they still dealt with issues of being a college student. Gaming was not the sole activity they do in their daily lives. As students had many other obligations including work and school activities, most of them were quite busy with managing multiple tasks and were not spending as much time on games as in their previous years. Hobbies are used for fun and relaxation with video games being no exception. Though there are pros and cons to video games, like any other hobby that a person has, too much time spent on one activity can lead to negative effects.