Games/children

December 23rd 2009

TIGA said today that it was surprised that Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrats’ Shadow Health Secretary had insinuated that video games were to blame for a decline in children’s fitness. TIGA made the comments following remarks by Norman Lamb that a report from the British Medical Journal shows a decline in children’s fitness and that the “...

health consequences for the PlayStation generation could be disastrous.”

Richard Wilson, CEO of TIGA, said:

“Video games can be mentally stimulating, educational and social, and some involve physical exercise. ‘Brain Training’, ‘Wii Fit’ games or ‘Civilisation’, ‘Singstar’ and ‘Buzz’ are cases in point. Video games have also been shown to have positive applications in the health arena. Several US hospitals have found that surgeons who play video games before surgery performed significantly better and made fewer mistakes than those that did not. Video games have also helped to encourage cancer patients to follow their medicinal regimes.

“Almost 30,000 people work in the UK games industry, including over 9,000 in game development. UK game developers are typically intelligent, highly qualified and creative individuals who work to produce high quality games for people’s entertainment. Thousands of them are parents themselves. They are not interested in creating a generation of slouch potatoes.

Any decline in children’s fitness levels is disappointing. The sale of so many school sports fields over the years is likely to have contributed to this deterioration.

“As it is almost Christmas, we will happily send a present to Norman Lamb MP: TIGA’s 2009 report Investing in the future. This report highlights the numerous benefits of video games. It will make stimulating reading over the Christmas period.”

Ends

Notes to editors:

About TIGA:

TIGA is the trade association representing the UK’s games industry. The majority of our members are either independent games developers or in-house publisher owned developers. We also have outsourcing companies, technology businesses and universities amongst our membership.

TIGA's vision is to make the UK the best place in the world to do games business. We focus on three sets of activities: political representation, generating media coverage and developing services that enhance the competitiveness of our members. This means that TIGA members are effectively represented in the corridors of power, their voice is heard in the media and they receive benefits that make a material difference to their businesses, including a reduction in costs and improved commercial opportunities.

For further information, please contact Eva Field, TIGA PR Manager on: 07814 039 983, or email eva@tiga.org.