Gaming may harm parental bond

Published on Friday 3 July 2009 22:20

PARENTS risk alienating their children if they allow them to play computer games too much, a leading author has claimed.

Bernadette Tynan, a former child development academic, said the solitary nature of the hobby has a negative effect on parent-child relations, which are crucial for development.

Ms Tynan who featured in a television documentary this year about spotting children's talents, asked if it was time to reassess the way parents and children interact in the media age.

She said: "Parents are right to be concerned about online products as some do tend to focus on solitary time and do little to help build parent-child relationships.

"We know from child development and neuroscience that building good communication between parent and child provides benefits on a number of levels in brain terms for children."

Research found 96 per cent of children play computer games, and 65 per cent use mobile phones to play games. Further research shows UK children spend twice as much time on the internet than parents think, at 43.5 hours a month.

Industry experts think the market for educational software, websites and games, could be worth up to 5.5 billion by 2012. Scotland has received international commendation for its use of technology in schools.

Star Wars director George Lucas, who heads a US educational technology foundation, has praised the Scottish schools' intranet, known as Glow.

Glow allows educational materials to be shared across Scotland and uses video conferencing so pupils can watch lessons held hundreds of miles away.

It is run by Learning and Teaching Scotland, which is responsible for creating the new school curriculum known as Curriculum for Excellence.

However, teachers have expressed concerns about Glow.

At the annual conference this year of Scotland's biggest teaching union, teachers demanded an investigation into how well teachers are trained to use the scheme.