Game skills pay off in real life

At the Charles Schwab company's call-center headquarters in Phoenix, human resources vice president Chip Luman has learned a secret about financial services technology and the employees who operate it:

``The people who play games are into technology, can handle more information, can synthesize more complex data, solve operational design problems, lead change and bring organizations through change,'' said Luman, 38.

Luman is among a host of professionals -- in fields including business, medicine and education -- who have noticed a surprising number of social benefits from the increasing time that Americans are spending with ``Super Mario,'' ``Rise of Nations'' and ``The Sims.''

Moreover, almost all the games they cite are mainstream hits from an industry that often is vilified as brainless and exploitative. Some of the games that have the most positive potential are either famously controversial or rated Mature because of violent or provocative content.

The industry heads into its annual convention next week -- E3, the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles -- as anti-game forces in numerous states are pushing for governmental intervention. In California, for example, the Assembly is preparing to vote on a bill that would prohibit the sale of certain violent games to anyone under 17.

But at the same time there's a growing wave of research and firsthand reports about children, parents, workers, corporations and even medical patients experiencing notable benefits from computer or video games. There's also a push to change the mindset of people who dismiss video games as dangerous or worthless.

``I'm extremely interested in scientific validation of gaming for good,'' said Dr. James Rosser, director of the Advanced Medical Technology Institute at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City.

Rosser, also the director of minimally invasive surgery, is a gamer who oversaw research indicating that surgeons adept at video games were less likely to make mistakes during certain forms of operations and suturing. The study, which used games that included sniper shooting (``Silent Scope'') and futuristic racing (``Star Wars Racer Revenge''), generated major publicity for games as possible teaching tools.

The potential teaching value is a key area of research for linguistics professor James Paul Gee at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Gee has studied a wide range of games, including ``Deus Ex,'' ``The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind,'' the ``Splinter Cell'' series, ``Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando'' and ``Fable.'' He concluded that numerous popular games, including many with a Mature rating, are designed with cutting-edge teaching principles that could be adapted for schoolwork or employee training.

For instance, Gee noted that some games, such as the historical-strategy game ``Rise of Nations,'' can be partly customized to suit each player. In choosing different ways to play, the gamer learns how to succeed in whatever manner is best for him or her personally.

But he also believes that some may have inherent educational value, including the seemingly lightweight ``Pokémon'' and ``Yu-Gi-Oh!'' video games. Those games, said Gee, feature such intricate jargon that children who are encouraged to discuss them can build crucial vocabulary skills.

The standard complaints about most video games are legion: Games make kids sedentary. They're violent and salacious. They're routinely sexist and often racist. They're shallow and addictive.

And all of these allegations have gotten considerable support from a loose coalition of politicians, educators, health officials, law enforcement officers and religious leaders.

• There's a growing interest in the workout value of dance games that require strenuous activity to perform the fast-paced steps indicated on the screen. The hallmark games are from Konami's ``Dance Dance Revolution'' series, and a PlayStation 2 and Xbox version of the arcade hit ``Pump It Up'' is scheduled for release in August.

One of a number of intriguing projects involves the West Virginia Public Insurance Agency, which is trying out DDR as a health and fitness tool in conjunction with schools, juvenile detention facilities and work-site wellness programs.

• Physicians are studying games as treatment aids. The Associated Press reported in December on research indicating that playing with a Game Boy machine before surgery could relax children more than tranquilizers.

• Luman, the vice president at Schwab, has held other human resources jobs, but also worked as a game company executive. He began to think more deeply about the connections between gaming and other work after reading ``Got Game: How the Gamer Generation is Reshaping Business Forever,'' by John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade.

Beck, president of the North Star Leadership Group, said in an e-mail interview that he and Wade surveyed 2,500 U.S. business professionals, turning up a powerful correlation between managerial behavior and playing video games.

Among the findings: Gamers are better risk-takers, show particular confidence in their abilities, place a high value on relationships and employee input and think in terms of ``winning'' when pursuing objectives.

Beck said the findings are proving helpful to baby boomer-generation managers who lead teams of younger, gamer employees.

``They learn that they have to develop the teams, structure the tasks and build rewards in very different ways than they might have naturally,'' Beck said.

One of the longest-running debates about video games focuses on whether their action and plots contain much sophisticated content, intellectually or emotionally. The most obvious examples of ``useful'' content are simulation games -- railroad-building, zoo-management and civilization-making games -- that include challenges involving economics, physics and political concepts.

But Henry Jenkins, director of the comparative media studies program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, also points to the down-home lessons delivered by games such as ``The Sims.''

In the virtual world of ``The Sims,'' where game players experiment with living alternative everyday lives through character avatars, Jenkins' young adult son discovered he was having personal money-management problems that reminded him of his real life. Except the consequences were more drastic.

``He realized his mistake,'' said Jenkins, ``but his character died of starvation in the back yard just as the pizza he ordered was being delivered to the front door.''

"your kid sounds like a loner without personal friends to spend time and bond with."

You either don't know today's video games or you don't know today's kids. Most kids are online in multiplayer games, and know more folks than we ever did as kids. I certainly know and keep in touch with a lot more folks now that I'm online.

Plus, the games that were mentioned above are actually physically active games. From what I understand, one of the new Star Wars tv hookup games is actually going to include a lightsaber game--where you play with a saber!

Video games are getting better at including physical activity. It's not just gamer's thumb anymore.

Learn about what you're deriding before you are so eager to judge.

You either don't know today's video games or you don't know today's kids. Most kids are online in multiplayer games, and know more folks than we ever did as kids.

Well if playing games online or talking to someone in chat rooms is your idea of interpersonal bonding and relationship building, then so be it. Each to his own. You sound like the type that would order a mail-order bride.

Learn about what you're deriding before you are so eager to judge.

Must be I struck a nerve for you to get so defensive. I do know what I speak of and I'm not the only one who understands that obsession with video games or withdrawal from personal interaction stuns a person's development of social skills necessary to interact in society. If that works for you, what do I care if you want to be a recluse. After all, it's a free country.

This public service announcement has been brought to you by Nintedo Corp. We now return you to your regualrly scheduled programming.

Actually, I think there's probably some truth to the observation. However, everything in moderation.

You really think that nobody here has built a personal relationship on the basis of online chatting or posting? There are quite a few folks who have MARRIED as a result of meeting here and I'm sure at least hundreds who've done so as a result of meeting online. I would say that's substantial interpersonal bonding.

Your post demonstrates your lack of knowledge about the online community and kids' interaction in it. Its insulting nature demonstrates nothing other than your personal bias against that community. I don't understand why you even bother with FR--it doesn't seem to meet your high standards for productive human activity.

And your crack about mail-order brides is uncalled for. You can ESAD, twerp.

Its insulting nature demonstrates nothing other than your personal bias against that community.

Oh, you're a community now? What next, a special designation by the government as a minority entitled to special rights and considerations? What are you going to do, charge me with a hate crime?

And your crack about mail-order brides is uncalled for. You can ESAD, twerp.

You proved my point. You're mighty brave with the name calling in the safety of anonymity and hiding behind your monitor. You would neither have the guts to do it in person or if you had grown up among people and learned courteous behavior, you wouldn't engage in juvenile behavior of name calling.

No need to apologize as I just consider the source, that of someone who is very challenged in social skills. Therapy or spending time interacting with adults, other than family, should help. You'll know that you've made progress when you can go to a white tablecloth restaurant and order a meal requiring use of silverware from a menu without pictures.

Oh, you're a community now? What next, a special designation by the government as a minority entitled to special rights and considerations? What are you going to do, charge me with a hate crime?

---You further establish your childlike inability to read. Could you be any more proud of your own ignorance of both the site on which you're posting and the posts to which you reply?

You proved my point. You're mighty brave with the name calling in the safety of anonymity and hiding behind your monitor.

---Pot, meet kettle. Let me know when you leave your basement. The light's mighty bright out there, though, so even though you're used to flamebaiting you might want to wear suntan lotion.

You would neither have the guts to do it in person or if you had grown up among people and learned courteous behavior, you wouldn't engage in juvenile behavior of name calling.

---Junior flings mud and doesn't like it back in his widdle eye. How sad. You must be awful proud of your big strong typing ability, too. Gawrsh, you sure showed me, tough guy, with all your humongous finger muscles. They're probably almost as built up as that lofty nose you stare down from.

No need to apologize as I just consider the source,

---Consider the source? BWA HA HA. Let me know when you consider any source besides your own bloated sense of self-worth.

that of someone who is very challenged in social skills. Therapy or spending time interacting with adults, other than family, should help.

---Personal knowledge on the subject of therapy obviously hasn't helped YOU.

You'll know that you've made progress when you can go to a white tablecloth restaurant and order a meal requiring use of silverware from a menu without pictures.

---Oh, THAT's what this is all about. You're a bitter waiter hoping to boost your chances of a tip by getting people out to restaurants that wouldn't normally bother with them. Sorry, I'm not your target audience. Some of us can afford internet service AND eat out, instead of snarfing from the customers' plates like you.

---No, though it's been an experience posting with you, I prefer to let the kitchen help like you fraternize with your own kind instead of annoying your betters. I cordially invite you to flamebait the rest of the world, and share that charmingly misanthropic little viewpoint of yours with it. I certainly have been overexposed to you, and thank you for it, since before I had seriously considered a short lunch, but now will partake of a full one and make sure that my high-school-age waiter does get a tip, so he doesn't bitterly waste the big folks' time online as you do. Goodbye!

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