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Let Children Get Bored Again

nytimes.com

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Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#101

Post by baroffoos »

birksherty wrote: post #64
tarr11 wrote: post #4

The parade of concerned parents writing these kinds of articles have conveniently forgotten how much TV and video games many of us consumed in 1980s and 1990s. This stuff reads like satire: “Rather than teach them to absorb material that is slower, duller and decidedly two-dimensional, like a lot of worthwhile information is, schools cave in to what they say children expect: fun. ” The kids are going to be alright.

I am a millennial myself. We watched tv, had video games. But also we played lot more in playgrounds for fun, talk, meet up, discuss in real space and had real laughs. Now I have seen kids in my neighborhood who don't know each other. In the free time they watch tv alone and uses social media most of the time. Only time they go out is for school, occasional shopping and other chores. I have not seen them with friends…

I don't know how it was for you but when I was in school I didn't know any of the kids in my suburb. Outside had endless roads and cars and no footpaths. Anything of interest requires having a parent to drive you there. The nearest playground is about 6km away. Online games was the only way to interact with friends outside of school.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#102

Post by Nasrudith »

mmmmpancakes wrote: post #92
marcell wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re trying to analyze raising children scientifically, and I think that’s impossible. You can never measure bored teens against non-bored teens in any meaningful way. No parent will want to, or be able to participate in a scientific study to tests the effects of boredom on their teens. What would that even look like? Randomize parents in two groups, and have them change their parenting in prescribed ways? No paren…

“You’re trying to analyze raising children scientifically, and I think that’s impossible.” You lost me already. You are flippantly dismissing everyone in developmental psychology and related fields with no justification.

The point is that they are individuals and one size fits all is doomed to failure. Any findings will be coarse and easy to confuse cause and effect. Just because children active in sports and music programs may be healthier and happier doesn't mean forcing the kid into both will improve things - by all means expose the kids to it, encourage them and let them pursue it but forcing a square peg into a round hole is good for no one.

There were worries that powerlines were harming children because children with homes near power lines had worse performance in schools. Analysis found that the mechanism for the "harm" was lowered property values - parents who lived near powerlines considered unsightly had fewer resources and it reflected in their children's academic performance.

A pure statistical approach on an individual level is like trying to have a full term baby in one month. Trying to actually raise children involves small N numbers with divergent starting states and control is impossible. You won't raise your second child in the same environment as the first - the year is different, you are different and there is the addition of an older sibling.

You can figure out great harms and benefits but anything else is shrouded in enough noise that attempting it at that level is practically superstition.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#103

Post by dkersten »

bitexploder wrote: post #83
dkersten wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how we used to think whatever the latest in graphics was, was oh so realistic and amazing! I played MUD’s for a few years when I was younger and in hindsight it was amazing: while the writing wasn’t typically as good as a book, you still filled in the world and characters with your imagination and it was both interactive and social. I still have some vivid memories of it that are as clear as if it had been a mode…

Some MUDs back in the day had combat and skill systems as complex as any modern MMOs. They were the precursor to MMORPG.

Absolutely. They were mechanically quite advanced in some cases and the roleplay heavy ones had some of the most immersive experiences I’ve had in any game.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#104

Post by el_nahual »

csmeder wrote: post #41

There are two separate issues: A. 1,000 ft view: drugs are bad. Both chemical drugs and electronic entertainment that is engineered to be addictive. Light weight drugs in small doses are less bad: 90s vs now. B. 50,000 ft view: the real problem. When rats are put in normal laboratory settings they choose drugs over food and water if given the choice. Most of our research on addiction is based on this. In a study wher…

A bit of a nitpick here but I think "Light weight drugs in small doses are less bad: 90s vs now." has a [citation needed]. In my (anecdotal, personal) experience, a heavy weight, sporadically used drug is much more effective than a light weight ones, especially for mental issues.

My heuristic for this is the following:

1. All psychic drugs have a main effect + side effect.

2. The benefit comes from changing your baseline mental "loops". This can happen slowly, or quickly, but requires something to be different. [citation needed]

3. Main effects can be, when taken to excess, if not necessarily _fun_, then certainly _different_, or new.

4. The industry is averse to their drugs being fun, because it leads to "abuse". So they only sell drugs where the main effect is small.

5. This means that most psychic drugs provoke a small change to baseline mental state, and (proportionally) large changes to everything else. So you feel a _little_ better, maybe, and very constipated/sleepless/irritated/whatever.

6. The ideal treatment would actually be super powerful drugs, like psilocybin, ketamine, MDMA, or LSD, taken very sporadically and in controlled (but not clinical) settings. Of course, this will never happen because of point (4).

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#105

Post by mmmmpancakes »

Nasrudith wrote: post #102
mmmmpancakes wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“You’re trying to analyze raising children scientifically, and I think that’s impossible.” You lost me already. You are flippantly dismissing everyone in developmental psychology and related fields with no justification.

The point is that they are individuals and one size fits all is doomed to failure. Any findings will be coarse and easy to confuse cause and effect. Just because children active in sports and music programs may be healthier and happier doesn't mean forcing the kid into both will improve things - by all means expose the kids to it, encourage them and let them pursue it but forcing a square peg into a round hole is goo…

I am not advocating for a pure statistical approach.

The parent of my first comment was making broad claims about the effects of boredom without justification. I dont think the assertion has any value without some good evidence. I was therefore providing the parent comment an opportunity to Contribute something more substantive than armchair speculation.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#106

Post by sudosteph »

UnpossibleJim wrote: post #12
cortesoft wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it is also interesting how they categorize the activities... apparently reading a book doesn’t count as “avoiding boredom”, but playing a video game does... why? Both are using something to entertain yourself, and it seems pretty arbitrary to distinguish between them. In fact, I am pretty sure there has been times on our history where reading fiction was treated the same way we treat watching YouTube videos tod…

Lol, I still remember my grandmother rolling her eyes at me reading Stephen King books as "serialized trash" when I was in my preteens during the summer months, while there was nothing else to do as she didn't believe in television.

Hah, same story here. Stephen King books totally made middle school and high school bearable for me.

The fact that every public library and used bookstore usually had over a dozen to pick from sure helped too.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#107

Post by Nasrudith »

abootstrapper wrote: post #79
anonu wrote: post #65

I disagree with the premise of the article and its conclusions to let kids get bored. Boredom is plain evil. It is not something that should be sought out. Rather, it is a symptom of unpreparedness or parents not stoking inherent creativity in their kids. As a kid, I rarely left home without a book. That habit still exists today. If I was "bored" or had some idle time, I had something to keep me entertained. On long…

Don’t you think the kid should be learning to cure boredom themselves? If you always tie your kids shoes, how will they learn to tie their own shoes? Likewise, if you always provide entertainment, how will they learn to entertain themselves?

That is why you need to teach them how to do something. If kids are expected to know something teach them it.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#108

Post by solipsism »

ThalesX wrote: post #96
IggleSniggle wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every game I played as a kid moved at my speed because they were turn based or puzzle based, with the exception of WarCraft. Even many games today that are popular with kids, like Minecraft, can move at real-time speed but still be designed to be self-paced. In Minecraft, there’s always an opportunity to stop and think.

I’ve never played Minecraft but it is my understanding that you have some sort of zombies that come nighfall. If these zombies catch you without shelter, they would presumably kill you. While this is a simple mechanic, I imagine even this small element of gameplay would turn a player towards thinking about survival rather than taking the opportunity to stop and think.

It's clear that your college course in game design is of less value, in the context of this conversation, than having actually done lots of gaming. Minecraft has a Creative Mode where all you do is build. Or explore. Or whatever you want, at your own pace. It's incredibly popular -- spend some time on YouTube looking up people's creations.

Let's remember the context. This is the quote we're talking about:

Because a video game move forward at it's speed, setting, since it keeps things going regardless, it's own agenda. A book only moves forward at the speed of a child's own thinking.

There are games that push you through like watching a movie. But even the most linear games let you make choices. Some games are slow, some are fast, some require quick thinking, some require slow calculated thinking. Some involve creativity, some involve math.

Talking about games as if they're just push you through some rigid narrative like a movie is just incredibly ignorant.

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#109

Post by hopler »

rjf72 wrote: post #38
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, in the late 19th and even going into earlier 20th centuries, reading books to avoid boredom did count (unless it was the Bible) in many families. Then they were afraid of radio and moving pictures, then TV, video games, etc...now its screen time on mobile devices, tomorrow we won’t worry about that anymore, but start instead worry about our kids being addicted to virtual realities....and so on.

Just because some people may have had concerns about one thing that is not necessarily justified does not then mean that we can extrapolate concerns about new technology going forward to then be defacto unjustified. I'm not sure of the entire psycho-physiological effects that books had on society, but we can see many very real negatives that are very likely causally related with our new technological pursuits. For in…

The Flynn countereffect is rife with speculation and motivated reasoning.

It's quite possible that the Flynn effect was "gaming" IQ scores by introducing education and basic nutrition to society at large. And the reduction of average IQ stores (reported in Norway and Denmark) was caused by immigration of less healthy refugees and people downplaying their own IQ to avoid military service.

Finally, high IQ is in no way required for reproduction, as the thousands of years of survival before the Flynn countereffect clearly shows

Re: Let Children Get Bored Again

#110

Post by solipsism »

ThalesX wrote: post #98
solipsism wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because a video game move forward at it's speed, setting, since it keeps things going regardless, it's own agenda. I feel like maybe you've not done much gaming? This sounds like Tipper Gore telling us about how heavy metal music inspires devil worship.

I took a college course in game design, one of the key components of said topic is ‘flow’. You want to keep the player in a state where it’s neither too hard nor too easy for them to continue playing. Make it too hard and the player loses interest. Make it too easy, the same behavior can be observed. If you want a game, you want to keep the player in a state of flow, if you can’t do that, the game would presumably no…

Any game design course worth its salt would cover Myst.

Tell me, in what way does Myst force an agenda in a way that a book does not?

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