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377: Parenting a Gamer, with Andrew Fishman LCSW · Beautifully Complex

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Your kid is three hours deep into a game, and
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: when you finally say it's time to stop, it's not
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: a small no, it's a full nervous system event. You've
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: probably wondered if that reaction means that gaming is the problem. Today,
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: I'm talking with Andrew Fishman, author of Parenting a Gamer
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and a therapist who specializes in gaming and mental health.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: We discuss what's actually happening in those moments, and why
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: gaming might be doing more for your neurodivergent kid than
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: you realize. I'm Penny Williams, and this is Beautifully Complex.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Welcome back, everyone. I am really excited to have this
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: conversation around parenting a gamer because I am a parent
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: of gamers, and I know that a lot of parents
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: really struggle with this. How much is too much? How
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: much is just right? Should they be online? Should they
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: not be online? All of these questions because we worry
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: about our kids and their health and their safety. And
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Andrew Fishman is here to help us kind of untangle
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: all of this and figure out safety, figure out benefits,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: all that good stuff. So, Andrew, will you start by
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: letting everybody know who you are and what you do?
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: Thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: I'm a social worker. I specialize in the impacts of
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: video games on mental health. I've been a therapist for
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: about nine years. I worked at a therapeutic school while
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: getting my master's degree. I spent three-ish years running group
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: therapy for autistic kids, teens, and adults. Right now, I
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: mostly work with adolescents, especially autistic people, and a lot
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: of gamers, a lot of nerds. For a lot of
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: my clients, they come in with their parents, and their
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: parents' main concern is, my kids spend so much time
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: playing video games that I think they're addicted. Can you
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: help us?
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Can you talk to us a little bit about that?
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: I think people are really confused about where the line
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: is for addiction.
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: So there is a thing called gaming disorder. Right now,
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: if you're familiar, there's a book called The DSM, which
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: is sort of the big tome that has every mental
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: disorder that we're aware of in it and how do
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: you diagnose it. And gaming disorder is in there as
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: sort of a provisional, we're not sure if this exists,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: diagnosis in the back. This has some evidence. We're continuing
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: to study. It might be in the next edition. And
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: when they're talking about gaming disorder, they're talking about tolerance,
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: feeling like you need to spend more and more time
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: gaming to get the same feeling, giving up other activities,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: loss of interest in things you used to enjoy, continuing
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: to play video games, even though it's causing you problems,
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: lying to family members, and then you know, risking other
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: aspects of your life to game more. A classic example,
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: I see it pretty regularly, is people who couldn't pull
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: themselves away from video games in college, ended up not
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: going to class because they needed to play World of
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: Warcraft or ended up not doing their homework and they just,
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: and they flunked out.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we hear those stories a lot. It's really tough.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: And I want to kind of backtrack a little bit,
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: I think, and talk about your perspective on gaming. Are
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: there benefits? What are the drawbacks? What are the pitfalls?
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: You know, thinking as a parent myself, how do we
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: navigate this thing that is here? Our technology is here.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: It's not going anywhere. Our kids are exposed to it
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: now at school, everywhere. So how do we help them
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: learn how to find that balance that you were just
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: talking about?
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: So the first thing I would say is that video
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: games are an art form like any other. It's like TV.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: It's like books. It's like movies. It's like going to
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: a museum sometimes. There are trashy games that I think
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: are kind of meaningless. And then there are really beautiful
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: games that are as impactful and wonderful as any TV
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: show I've ever seen or any book I've ever read.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: The narratives are amazing. The gameplay is fun and exciting.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: There's a lot of social benefits. We can get into
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: all of these things. I think... One of the things
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: that draws most of my clients to video games, and
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: I think this will resonate with a lot of your listeners,
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: is that video games are fair. That more than any
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: other part of your life, if you practice and work
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: really hard and you follow the rules and you adapt,
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: you're going to win. You can succeed in this game.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: where success is not guaranteed in any other part of
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: your life for the rest of your life. You could
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: do everything right and not get a job. You could
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: do everything right and flunk out of college because it
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: wasn't right for you. There are aspects of interpersonal relationships
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: that are just beyond your control. And video games are
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: uniquely safe in that way, that it's predictable and it's
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: fun and it's accepting.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: So many good things in there, right? That predictability for
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: a lot of our neurodivergent kids, they crave that. but
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: also the social aspect. My own son, who's about to
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: turn 24, he talks all the time, and he has
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: since he was little, about the fact that interacting with
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: people is so much easier online than it is in person.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: And so that pulls our kids in that direction. How
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: do we help them sort of throttle that maybe like
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: you know learn where boundaries should be where time frames should.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: Be so I think what a lot of people find
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: reassuring is that most people never develop like a true
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: problem with video games there's a sort of push and
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: pull sometimes I spend more if I'm really into a
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: game sometimes I spend less because there's nothing hooking me
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: at the moment and most people it doesn't really impact
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: their well-being one way or the other it's just another
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: fact of life I think the last statistic I read
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: was that something like 91% of teen boys play video
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: games regularly. And 91% of boys are not being impacted
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: negatively by this activity. For most people, it's just fun.
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: And so I always encourage people to look at the
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: other parts of their life also. Does your kid have
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: other interests? Does your kid have a social life? Is
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: your kid doing well at school? Are they doing extracurricular activities?
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: Are they learning a musical instrument? If this is not
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: the only thing they're doing and they have a well-rounded life,
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: their use of video games is probably fine. It's probably
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: just a harmless way to relax after a long day.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I'm just thinking about how much of a struggle
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: that still is for a lot of parents. And I think,
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: and you can tell me if I'm wrong, but it
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: feels like it's a generational difference also. And that's how
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of parents are getting caught up.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: We older parents who didn't grow up with gaming, didn't
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: grow up with cell phones and computers in our hands,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: and it feels so different that it feels sort of threatening.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: That's kind of where my head is going as we're talking.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: I think younger parents who've grown up with it maybe
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: don't worry as much about it. Do you sense that too?
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Oh, absolutely. And there's actually some evidence that even
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: scientists are subject to that kind of bias, that scientists
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: who don't like video games or didn't grow up with
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: them are more likely to criticize and see them as
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: harmful than people who grew up with them themselves and
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: know more about the games.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: And so I think there's absolutely a stigma.
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. So we've established that they're most often not harmful.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: I think there's two directions to go now. One is
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: about safety, because that's definitely a concern. and also about benefits.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: So what makes more sense first?
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: So to talk to your viewers for a second, I
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: wrote a book about this subject. And the first subject,
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: the first topic of the book, the first third is
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: sort of a primer 101. And then also what are
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: the benefits? So from that perspective, I think that makes sense.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely. And we'll link the book up for everyone too.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: Thank you. So the benefits of gaming, it's, I think,
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: first off, the same benefits that you would experience from
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: any work of art. It increases your experience of the world.
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: It just makes your world bigger. The more stories you
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: are exposed to, I think the better person you end
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: up being, the more empathy you have. And it's hard
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: to describe what art does to you, but I think
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: it just makes you a more whole person. There's also
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: social benefits, as we talked about, any time that you
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: can connect with other people, even if it's over a
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: shared game, especially if it's over a shared game. It's
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: just a nice way to spend time and just become
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: a more interesting, well-rounded person. Social time is always good.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: For autistic people, I think you alluded to this earlier,
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: where it feels like a safer, easier place to socialize.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: One of the ways that I think about that is
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: that there's a lot that neurotypical people take for granted
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: in social settings. How much eye contact is too much?
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: How do I know if this person is really interested
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: in what I have to say? Can I talk about
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: my special interest? Have I said too much about it?
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Has this person's body language indicated that they want to
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: end this conversation? What are their facial expressions telling me?
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: And although autistic people can often do a lot of
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: those things, it's a lot of juggling in your head.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: It's a lot of trying to remember, wait, shoot, their
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: feet are pointed toward the door and they said this
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: one thing. And so now I have to figure out, well, okay, shoot,
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: do I pivot then the conversation? Have I said too
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: much about myself? And a lot of those barriers go
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: away in a game. Yeah. Where if your special interest
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: is Minecraft and you are playing Minecraft, everyone in that
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: room has self-selected to hear about Minecraft. Everyone is interested
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: about it. You don't have to worry about it. You
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: don't have to worry about eye contact. You can't even
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: make eye contact in this space. You don't have to
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: worry about body language. It's... easier to script socially. And
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: so it's both its own good thing and also a
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: good stepping stone, a place to practice social relationships that
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: you can then take out into the real world.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. And talk to us a little bit about
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: the safety around that, because I know a lot of
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: parents worry, and this was a huge concern of mine,
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: Two is we don't know the other people that they're
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: interacting with in that space. And some of them are predators.
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: There's no dancing around that. Most of them, I think,
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: are not, right? It's not the majority. But how do
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: we keep our kids safe in those spaces? Do we
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: have to be there with them to do that?
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: So there's two pieces to this that I would bring up.
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: One of them is there are parental controls in most,
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: if not all, games or settings within the menu if
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: it's not a direct parental control. And that's to limit
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: who's allowed to talk to your kid. So in Fortnite,
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: just as an example that I think does it really well,
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: there's a sliding bar in the settings menu if you
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: go to communications or connections, I forget what it's called.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: But you go to this one area and then there's
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: a sliding bar that says everyone can talk to me.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: Or if you slide it a little less, it's only
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: my friends and the people I'm currently on a team
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: with can talk to me. If you slide it a
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: little further, then it's only my friends can talk to me.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: And then if you slide it further, no one can
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: talk to me. And so again, there's options in all
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: these games from I just want to play this game
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: and I don't want anyone to hear what I'm saying
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: and I don't want to hear what anybody else is saying.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: And then it goes all the way up to anyone,
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: including those predators, can talk to me. I think that option,
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: that most extreme anyone can talk to me, should be
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: off in every game that kids are playing.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: For sure.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: And the problem with Roblox in particular, as the most
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: notorious example, is that although they changed it recently, I've
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: heard mixed reviews, it used to at least be that
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: you could only set it to everyone can talk to
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: me or nobody can talk to me. There was no
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: friends only option. And so if your 10-year-old kid wants
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: to talk to other 10-year-olds from his class and they're
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: all talking in Roblox, There was no way to also
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: disallow 50-year-olds from another state to talk to them. And
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: so if you have the option, and I would go
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: into the game settings, the kids' favorite games, and just
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: turn that option off for strangers to talk to them.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: And then I think to your second point, I think
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: that the best thing that parents can do is to
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: play with their kids just to see what's going on,
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: to spend some positive time with them, to get a
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: good bonding experience. There's a lot of benefits to playing
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: with your kids. And one of them is to passively
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: monitor You know, I keep hearing my kid talking on
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: his headset. Are they talking to other kids that I
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: would approve of or are they talking to people that
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't? And you can't make good decisions if you
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: don't have enough information. Yeah.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: We really need to engage with them about what they're
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: doing online, have those conversations and know what's going on. Yeah.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: It's so good to hear about those parental controls because
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: when my kid was 10, those didn't exist. We were
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: just trying to figure out how, like, how do we
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: limit I guess, who they're with and what's going on.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: And it was much, much more difficult then. So I
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: know parental controls have come a long way now.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: They also make for a more pleasant experience generally. I
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: still turn on some of those settings myself. Grand Theft
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Auto has an online version where you're playing with other people.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: I played it for maybe three minutes before I heard,
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: you know, it sounded like elementary school children yelling racial slurs.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: And I thought to myself, I just don't want any
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: of that in my life. I'm done. I just went
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: to the setting right away, turned it off, Much more
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: pleasant experience. I'd turn it off at any age. I
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: think it's generally a bad idea.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: A lot of our neurodivergent kids have this really strong
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: sense of justice. This was a big thing with my
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: own kid, gaming and online, is when people weren't behaving themselves,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: he wanted to fix it. He would engage to try
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: to get them to be better, to do better. And
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: it was a real battle to get him to not
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: engage in that stuff, to just let it go, move on.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: I don't know if you have any words of wisdom
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: around that, but I found that to be, and so
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: many parents that I talk to in coaching and stuff
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: are like, this sense of justice just kills us. It
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: takes us into places that we just don't need to
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: go all the time.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: What you're describing is very real. This sense of justice,
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: this sort of, there is a right way to do things.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: And often they're right. Those people shouldn't be acting that way.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: And it's not fair. And it's wrong. And you want
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: them to stop. And you can't. And that's the hardest
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: part for a lot of people is that the people
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: online who are saying the worst things are doing it
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: for fun. They're doing it because they enjoy the fight.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: They enjoy the attention that it gives them. And so
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: the only way to really stop them is to just
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: not give them that attention. It's just report them, block them,
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: move on. And that feels like not enough. It feels
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: like you should convince them otherwise. It feels like you
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: should just show them the error of their ways. And
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: the reality is that that doesn't change anybody's mind ever,
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: especially on the internet. It's just telling them that they're
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: wrong and yelling at them. And it doesn't do anything
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: if that person is not acting in good faith. This
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: is not a debate. This is a troll on the internet.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: And so the best tool that you have as someone
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: who cares about justice and cares about people acting right,
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: block them and move on. And if enough people do that,
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: it stops being fun for them and they stop.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So eventually that can work.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: That I need a resolution right now thing gets you stuck.
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: It's so real. It's hard to get at least my
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: kid to move on from that. I was like, no,
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: I'm going to make sure they know that they're being hateful. Yeah.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Can we talk a little bit about that power struggle
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: around gaming? This is something I think every parent probably
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: knows at this point if your kid's old enough to
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: be gaming, especially like when we're asking them to stop.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: When it's time to transition to do something else, sometimes
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: we see the most surprising and challenging behavior out of
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: our kids when And I think we interpret that as, well,
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: then gaming isn't a good thing for them. If they
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: can't transition, then we just need to not do it
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: at all. Where do you fall in that debate? What
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: is the evidence kind of telling you about what's going
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: on there?
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: Well, first, I'd say that transitions are hard and have
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: always been hard. And games are no exception. If your
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: kid is really into music, maybe playing the saxophone is
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: their thing and transitioning them away from that and toward
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: bedtime or toward a shower at the end of the
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: day or toward homework is going to be a struggle too.
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: Games are no exception to that. And so I don't
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: think that they are uniquely bad in that way, in
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: that transitions are just hard. The other thing that I
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: would encourage parents to look for and to listen for
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: is when you say it's time to go to bed,
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: time to turn the games off for the night. what
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: do they say is the reason that they want to
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: keep playing? Because there are different categories and different ways
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: that you can respond as a parent based on what
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: they identify as the problem. So if it's, but my,
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: you know, we're in the middle of a round, my
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: friends are going to lose. That's different. That's a different problem,
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: a different kid and a different solution that you can implement.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: Then I just need one more minute. Then I'm going
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: to finish. And then I'm almost there. I'm almost at
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: the end of the level versus I need to finish,
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: or I'm not gonna be able to do this thing anymore. Or,
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: One of the harder reasons is if they're playing to
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: sort of dull emotional pain and the rest of the
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: world is just more difficult and they don't want to
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: go back to the real world. But the point is
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: that each of those categories requires a different response from
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: you and you can't know how to respond if you
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: don't know what the problem is. And so I think
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: that for most parents, the first step, first and most
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: important step is stay curious, stay calm and talk to
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: the kid about what was actually happening in that moment.
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: What made it so hard for you? on top of
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: it just being a transition.
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: And they're not always going to be able to have
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: that conversation in that moment.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: Very good point.
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: Sometimes we, you know, a lot of times I think
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: we have to wait. I remember realizing that for my
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: own kid, it was like, I'm at a point where
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: I can't save. Everything I've been doing all this time
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: is going to be lost if I don't have five
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: more minutes so I can save. And I, you know,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: I started talking to parents about like, imagine you're watching
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: this mystery, this whodunit movie, and somebody right when they're
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: about to tell you who actually did it, they turn
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: it off and they say, sorry, we got to go
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: do something else. Like you would be upset too.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: Yes. And it's truly like, all right, if I needed
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: five more minutes and then I would happily turn it
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: off because then I will have all the ends will
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: be tied up and I will know who did it
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: and I can move on.
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: And the saving is a big one too, where if
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: I had been working on a proposal for work or
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: something for an hour, And for whatever reason, I couldn't
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: save my progress until I finished this paragraph. Oh, you
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: couldn't stop me from finishing that paragraph. That's a tremendous
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: amount of work and effort put in. And it's the
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: same thing for a lot of games. Sometimes you have
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: to reach a checkpoint to save it.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: So for the kids who you give them five more
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: minutes and now they want another five minutes, they want
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: another 10 minutes, they want just one more minute. Is
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: that where we're starting to see more of a problem
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: that we need to address maybe?
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: I think that's certainly one sign. There are some games
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: that just work against you in that way. Some games
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: are designed to be, you're always five minutes away from something.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: And they overlap all these goals so that as soon
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: as you finish one, you think, all right, well, I'm
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: going to, as soon as I reach the town, Then
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: I'm going to turn it off. And then you get
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: to the town and somebody goes, oh, can you do
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: this one more thing for me? We're five minutes. And
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: you're like, okay, well, surely now that I can do this,
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: I can five more minutes. I wrote about this in
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: the book. I've fallen into this trap too. There's a
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: game called Skyrim where they give you, you know, there's
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: 300 different quests and all of them are, they only
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: take a couple of minutes each and they overlap. So
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: when you're just finished one, you're also almost finished with
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: the next one. And three hours went by without realizing it.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: It's now two in the morning. And I thought, shoot,
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: I was supposed to go to bed. How did that happen? Yeah.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: And so it's an easy trap to fall into, even
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: as adults, even as people who know better. Some of
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: the games just work against you. And so if that's
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: your kid, maybe talking to them about maybe that specific
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: game is causing more problems than it's helping for you.
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: That segues right into the next thing I wanted to
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: ask you, which is, can you list some specific games
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: that you find... help to build skills, have benefits? Do
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: you have some favorites?
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: Oh gosh, I like so many games. The first one
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: that comes to my mind is Minecraft. The single player
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: or co-op version of it as a way to practice
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: planning ahead, as a way to be creative and I'm
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: not sure how much you and your listeners know about Minecraft,
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: so I'll back up a second. Minecraft is an extraordinarily
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: popular game, and it's very creative, where you're dropped in
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: what's called a sandbox world, where you can do whatever
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: you want. You can create and destroy parts of the environment,
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: you can raise animals, you can go hunt monsters, you
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: can go build a building, and you have a tremendous
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: amount of creative power over this world. And so people
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: use it to recreate buildings from their neighborhood. They use
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: it to build their dream mansion. They use it to
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: raise livestock and create a little farm to gather resources.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: And some of them want to gather the best things
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: and then delve into the mines and figure out what's
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: down there. And there's a lot of forethought and planning
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: that is just naturally built into this game, where if
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: I want to build this mansion of my dreams... I
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: need to not only figure out what I want it
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: to look like and then execute, I need to gather
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: those resources that will allow me to... I need to
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: go get wood if I want to go build a
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: log cabin. And so there's a lot of creative potential
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: in this game. I think most directly, that's a game
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: that I would suggest has benefits. Yeah. There's a game,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: another one that I mentioned in the book, it's called Balotro,
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: but people pronounce it Balotro, where it looks like poker,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: it looks like gambling, but it's all statistics and numbers
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: and probabilities. And you're trying to get the highest score by, gosh,
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: it's complicated and hard to describe. It's a lot of math.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: And so it's the Fibonacci sequence and it's multipliers on
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: multipliers on exponents and repeated exponents. It gets really complicated
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: really fast.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: I can go on, but I think you get the point.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: There's a lot of games and ways to view them
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: as beneficial in that way. Actually, sorry, there's one more
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: game that just came to mind. I'm not sure if
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: this is actually released yet or not, but I was
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: given early access to a game called AVA, A-V-A, which
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: is designed for autistic kids to practice social skills. Oh, wow.
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: And so you're this little girl named Ava, and you're
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: flying around this world, and you're talking to people, and...
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: You're sort of guided through social scripts and conversations where
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: you talk to someone and then you have multiple choice.
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: What do you want to say to them next? And
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: then if you say something that's rude, then the person
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: reacts poorly. And Ava thinks to herself, oh, gosh, I
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: really said that was too much too soon, wasn't it?
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: I should probably try again. And it goes through some
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: of the really easy mistakes that we all fall into
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: and gently guides you into what are some other ways
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: that you could handle various interactions. It was designed by
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: autistic people for autistic people. Very cool.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: Sounds amazing. Yeah.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: Really amazing. Because they're getting that feedback in real time
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: without maybe that social danger. Not danger, but like, you know.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: The stakes are low in this game.
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Amazing. There are a million more things
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: we could talk about, and we're already running short on time.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: Is there anything that we haven't talked about that you
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: feel like is really, really important for parents to hear
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: right now?
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that the biggest takeaway I really want
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: people to have is to play alongside your kids. And
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: this is probably going to be uncomfortable for a lot
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: of people, especially if you didn't grow up with the games.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: It's going to be strange to play with your kid
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: in a way that you're going to be bad at
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: it for a while. You might want to just watch.
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: You might want to just sit next to them while
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: they show you all around their virtual world. But it's
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: such a good way to bond, to connect, to learn more,
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: to learn what the language is that you can use.
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: Where if you know, for example, that your kid does
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: these things called raids and, you know, maybe you don't
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: really know what they are, but you know that they
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: take 30 minutes each and that you can't save until
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: the end of it. That informs a lot of your
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: parental decisions and gives you the language to communicate more
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: effectively with your kid. You can say, look, I know
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: you're in the middle of a raid, but we need
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: to turn this right off right now because grandma's coming
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: over in three minutes. That's more effective communication than just
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: you need to turn it off. Just acknowledging that there's
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: a problem and using the kid's language helps bridge those gaps.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: For sure. Yeah, absolutely. My kids wanted me to play
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: and wanted me to play. And then they're like, you're
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: really holding me back. Maybe I don't need you here.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I bet that was a really fun day for them.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: Because I'm not a gamer.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: I bet that was so fun.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: For them, though. Yeah, to be the authority and the
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: one who knows how to do something better than mom. Absolutely. Completely.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: Tell everybody where they can find you online and where
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: they can find The Buck Parenting a Gamer.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: So my website is videogamehealth.com. You can see a lot
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: of articles and things that I've written there. You could
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: find the book anywhere books are sold. It's called Parenting
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: a Gamer. Help your child build healthy habits, make positive choices,
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: and find balance in virtual worlds.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: And thank you for focusing on this. Thank you for
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: helping us to navigate this. It is a challenge for so,
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: so many families. And I think understanding what are the benefits?
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: Are there problem areas what can we do to make
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: sure this is healthy that's how we alleviate some of
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: the worry and the anxiety that we have around it
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: and our kids can then have a better experience so
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: i really appreciate that um this is some of the
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: world that you're doing your work in and i was
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: just so happy to talk to you and happy to
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: have you here i really appreciate.
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: It thank you so much let's do it again sometime
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: yeah i.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: Will put all of andrew's links in the show notes
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: for everyone And I hope to see you next time.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Take good care. Visit beautifully-complex.com for more resources, coaching, and
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: parent training. And help another kid by sharing this with
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: someone who could benefit from listening.