Pandemic Technology

May 2020

My research has definitely taken a back seat lately, but I have not stopped thinking about it.  Right now, parents are working from home.  Kids are learning from home.  At the same time.  This alone has presented numerous issues for many families.  Other issues - not to be ignored - are those parents who lost their jobs, who cannot physically work right now, families who cannot afford to eat right now or cannot access grocery stores, increased mental health issues, and the list goes on.  The pandemic provides a new context for my research.  The last time the world experienced something similar was 100 years ago.  Can you IMAGINE how different it was in 1918?!  Families quarantined at home would have had NO way to contact their loved ones.  Children quarantined at home would have had NO way to see their teachers and friends or get school work.  Adults whose workplace shut down would have had NO way to work remotely.  In this respect, all this technology has been a wonderful thing, as it has allowed many parents to continue working and earning a paycheck.  It has also helped children continue their education (no matter how stressful it may be for all involved).  The bottom line is that technology is helping keep us in contact with others.

Before this all happened, I was in the process of narrowing down my research questions, and the "new normal" of many families right now has helped shape them.  My focus has shifted more to parents' perceptions of violent video games rather than the kids who play them.  Because parents are working from home and need uninterrupted time, many children are experiencing the joys of many more hours of screen time than they did before Covid-19.  From what I can gather on social media, parenting blogs, and conversations with actual real-life in-person friends (whom I talked to virtually, of course, and/or at a distance of more than 6' away), parents do not like this new trend that has emerged.  Parents feel guilty for letting their kids play video games for hours on end right now.  They chalk it up to "just getting through quarantine," which is completely and totally valid.

I wonder, however, why parents feel guilty about this.  (Important side note: I also feel guilty about this happening in my own house.)  A year ago, I believed that video games - especially violent ones - were bad for children.  I felt like they hindered creativity, isolated them, prevented them from playing outside, and "melted their brains."  It appeared to me that young children in my classroom who played these games were more prone to emotional outbursts and violence.  I know many parents have these same concerns.

I have spent the past year reading EVERYTHING I possibly can about video games and the research that has been done in the past few decades.  The results of my research were surprising.  All the research that connects video games to violence is basically junk!!!  Nearly all of it set out with an agenda, paid for and supported by the same group.  The group even peer-edited each other's research. [insert face-palm here]  All of this research measures "aggression" in terms of making a hot sauce for someone who doesn't like spicy foods or blasting loud noises at another person.  These are just "rude" behaviors, not true violence or aggression.  There is much better research out there that says "violent video games actually do not cause aggression," but because that doesn't fit with the image of video games the media has painted, that research has a tough time making it to the public.  This is where my research is taking a slight turn.  I am going to compare media headlines with research about video games.  Then I'm going to interview parents and teachers about their video game perceptions and why they think this way.  I *think* I'll still hold small focus groups of children to have them talk about their video game play.  I want to know why kids like playing these games, and how their reasons compare with their parents' reasons for allowing or not allowing them to play.  Does media play a role?  Peers?  Age of parents?  Age of children (though all the children in my study will be 5-8)?  Parents' own experiences with video games (also probably correlated with age)?  Have parents' perceptions changed since being quarantined?  What about teachers: why do they hold the views that they do, and have their perspectives shifted because of Covid-19?  After this research is conducted and my degree is complete, the next step is to create some sort of "intervention" or "education" piece to help families understand the research and how to make their kids' video games fit into their lives.

I have always had a special interest in what can be categorized as Parent Education.  I don't like to look at it in that way, though, because that term makes it seem like parents need me to tell them what to do or how to do it.  Um, nope.  Nobody can tell anybody what is best for THEIR kid.  I do believe, though, that we can HELP each other by sharing information.  I really enjoy sharing information with other parents.  I love to learn stuff and even moreso, I love to share it.  When I first embarked on my PhD journey, I had many parents ask me to please keep them informed about what I find.  This is why you are reading my blog!