> All the research on the subject shows incontrovertibly that 5 is way too young for video games.
First, "all the research" means "all the psychological research". Recent scandals demonstrate that psychological research has the approximate value of astrological forecasts:
Quote: "In their exhaustive final report about the fraud affair that rocked social psychology last year, three investigative panels today collectively find fault with the field itself. They paint an image of a "sloppy" research culture in which some scientists don't understand the essentials of statistics, journal-selected article reviewers encourage researchers to leave unwelcome data out of their papers, and even the most prestigious journals print results that are obviously too good to be true."
Second, one would want to compare video games with whatever a 5-year-old would be doing instead. Looked at that way, obviously a well-designed age-appropriate video game might represent an improvement over its alternatives in some cases.
Finally, let's let the parents decide -- you know, the people who ignored all conventional wisdom and decided to have the child in the first place?
Speaking of sloppy work, you link to an article on social psychology yet extrapolate the findings to the whole of psychology. You then throw the baby out with the bathwater by claiming the entire thing is useless when it's not.
The nature of psychology lends itself to more fuzzy or fraudulent work, but by saying that psychological research is itself useless, you're also throwing away things like A/B testing, UX testing (including Apple's much-vaunted usability stuff), research into grief management, team-building research, research into cognitive recovery therapy after acquired brain injury, work looking into ameliorating sexism and racism, perception research for HUDs in fighter aircraft (my honours research), some pain management research, research into dealing with PTSD, research into crowd control and management...
... all this (and more) is apparently useless, simply because you've got a chip on your shoulder. Fuck I'm tired of people just taking pot-shots at a soft target that they don't understand and never bother to.
