Alarming Decline of Quality Youth Playtime

Re:Alarming Decline of Quality Youth Playtime by BadCookie on Wednesday January 23, 2019 @08:04PM (#18985062)

My sister has a 5-year-old son. I asked her what toy I should get him for Christmas. She said, "Oh, he doesn't play with toys anymore. He only plays video games." I was aghast. A 5-year-old who ... doesn't like toys? It can't be healthy. And the really sad part is that my sister doesn't see a problem.

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Re:Alarming Decline of Quality Youth Playtime by playplay on Thursday January 24, 2019 @07:39AM (#18988101)

ofc it's healthy

there's no extensive evidence that it's not healthy, and by default everything is 'healthy', if the kid is happy, along with the various other metrics, then they are healthy

games can be a toy, but most video games are not toys, and almost all are designed to be competitive. toys are not competitive things

play is not about it being healthy or not, it's about if play is desirable or not

as 'kirion25' wonders in their comment, the problem is that almost nobody knows anything about play

for example one person mentions activities/functions that is leisure, and not everything within leisure is play (play is a subset of leisure)

nobody knows if there's any decline or incline in play, where's the extensive evidence that of play's claimed decline?

https://dynamicland.org/

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Re:Alarming Decline of Quality Youth Playtime by claudiulodro on Thursday January 24, 2019 @11:28AM (#18990103)

I dunno. Playing with toys is an important way to build and practice fine-motor skills, and that won't happen by touching a screen all day.

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