China To Limit Children’s Gaming Time To 3 Hours Per Week
According to Bloomberg, children under 18 in China will be limited to only one hour of gaming every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I don’t know about you but three hours isn’t even my average per day!
News
This is not the first time China has restricted gaming availability. In 2019 they originally set the limit to one and a half hours almost every day. This escalation may be due to the increase of investors in the Chinese stock market. According to Daniel Ahmad, who spoke to Bloomberg, “This ruling is the strictest one to date and will essentially wipe out most spending from minors, which we note was already extremely low”.
Good News
While this isn’t mentioned in the original article, there are also several health and wellbeing benefits to cutting down on gaming. As discussed in the psychology site Verywell Mind, when people interact with a stressful in-game experience they are more likely to cause a loud disruption to another person – something that is considered an act of aggression. Another study found that violent games can also cause an increase in stress.
Bad News
However, the same article also provides proof that perhaps this is not entirely good news. On the contrary, some games can specifically provide stress relief. I’m not sure what I would’ve done without Animal Crossing: New Horizons when the Coronavirus outbreak started last year! Video games also provide a platform for people to bond over and work together to complete. From young children to fully-grown adults solving puzzles together over a gaming format can be incredibly effective for team-building and trust practise!
Whether this is good news or bad news, the children in China will soon be having to try a lot harder to win in competitions. I’m sure there will still be plenty of raw talent in Fortnite servers from those who love it!
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