Videogames May Inhibit Kids' Language Skills

If you're looking for another excuse to moderate your kids' videogame playing, here's one. Introducing videogame systems to young children may inhibit their reading and writing skills, a study found.

Some researchers at Denison University in Ohio looked at the short-term effects of videogame playing, studying two groups of boys 6 to 9 years old.

One group was given videogame systems so the researchers could compare them to a group without games over a four-month period. Naturally, the boys with the systems spent more time playing videogames than after-school reading and writing exercises. Those boys had lower reading and writing scores than the kids in the other group and more teacher-reported learning problems, the study published in the journal Psychological Science found.

"Our findings suggest that videogame ownership may impair academic achievement for some boys in a manner that has real-world significance," the researchers write. That's because language study problems at a young age may make it tougher for children to improve their skills later on, the researchers say.

While this study may sound like some stuffy psychologists who simply don't like videogames, it's another item for discussion in the broader debate over kids and games.

While the game industry is going through a bit of a slump, Americans still spent $1.2 billion on systems, game software and accessories in January. The game makers are trying to juice sales with high-profile marketing campaigns. Sony advertised its God of War 3 videogame during the Super Bowl. In January, Activision Blizzard Inc. said its heavily promoted Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 had more than $1 billion in sales since its November debut.

Of course, those games aren't marketed to 9-year-old kids. (Right.)

The violent mature-rated titles have been the subject of another controversy as some research points to the effects on social behavior in teens. The study by the Denison researchers (involving games like Lego Star Wars II) really speaks to the sames thing we've been hearing about TV from psychologists for years: age-appropriate activities can be OK in moderation. Too much videogame playing is going to suck time from other stuff.