The New Digital Playground: Why Modern Gaming Feels Different for Parents | Bonus

This episode explores how digital gaming has evolved from a finished product into a continuous, living environment that continues whether a child is logged in or not. Doctoral candidate and researcher Soyoung Park joins the show to break down the four structural changes in modern games—including monetization and social obligations—that often lead to tension and conflict within families.

Transcript

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 0:09

- Welcome back to the Science of Parenting podcast, where we connect you with research based information that fits your family. I'm Mackenzie DeJong Schelling, podcast co-host and a parenting educator. We are doing a bit of a mini series for a few episodes, diving into a topic that almost every family is dealing with, which is digital games. If you're a parent, you might have asked yourself, why do these games feel so different from those ones that I grew up with? Or maybe, why is this so hard to tell my child to just turn off the game, right? So to help us understand what is really going on, we are joined by Soyoung Park an ISU doctoral student who studies digital game culture and family life. Thanks for being with us, Soyoung.

Soyoung Park: 0:55

Yeah, Thank you for inviting me. I'm Soyoung Park, a graduate student in human development and family studies, and my research focuses on digital literacy, current game culture, and its influence on everyday family life. Things like family routines, communication, boundaries, and some misunderstandings between parents and children.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 1:19

So some things I've heard a lot lately is about children's gaming habits. Things like I don't know, I don't like how intense my child's gaming has become. Games weren't like this when I was growing up, or maybe it feels harder to control. So let me ask you this, why does current digital gaming matter for families, and why does it feel so different from those games that many parents grew up with?

Soyoung Park: 1:42

Well, gaming is a part of mainstream entertainment now, and it's happening in almost every neighborhood, every school and communities in the United States. About 82% of all families report playing games with their children at home. And today's parents are the most game friendly generation in history. They grew up gaming themselves, or at least they grew up with the games in the house. That means they are, they are not completely unfamiliar. In fact, many are open minded and even willing to participate. However, these days, we can easily see some conflicts between parents and children around intensive gaming habits. Something important parents need to understand is games today are no longer just entertainment. They are living environments. So when parents, when parents think about games, they remember something like Nintendo, Sega, or only PlayStation. You buy a game, play it, and eventually you finished it. There was a clear ending and a sense of completion. So you could say, okay, I'm done. In the past.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 3:10

Sure. You know, I played all sorts of games on, especially Sega. I was a Sega kid. But we know that today is different or today's games are very different. Right?

Soyoung Park: 3:19

Yes. Many popular games now operate as what we call games as a service. This simply means the game never really ends. It constantly updates and there are new seasons, new events, limited time rewards, and many online activities are happening every single week. So children are not just playing a game. They are participating in an ongoing digital world. That one, keeps moving forward. And when something feels like a living world than then a finished product, it naturally becomes hard to step, step away from.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 4:05

Sure. That's so true. You know, it. It's like, hey, I'm stuck in this. And that's where it gets complicated. I heard you say, even though parents feel familiar with those games, really, it's the structure of the game that has changed dramatically. And, you're seeing that that structural change is what, maybe, what creates that tension at home. Right. So what exactly has changed?

Soyoung Park: 4:30

that's great questions. Let's break down in a simple way. There are four major differences between classic games and modern games. First, the monetization models. In the past, games are usually a one time purchase. You bought a game and that's it, No ongoing payments, no constant offers. But today, many games are free to download, which sounds great at first, right?

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 5:01

Sure. Yeah.

Soyoung Park: 5:01

Yeah, but once you’re inside a game, there are endless opportunities to spend money for skin updates, battle passes, special characters, limited items, and pay to win systems. Yeah. So instead of a one payment, children are repeatedly invited to spend. And that introduces a brand new family conversation about spending, impulse control, and digital purchases. And second, the sense of an ending. So again classic games had a classic finish line. You could complete the game and you could say, I made it. But modern games are designed to never truly end. And as I said, there are a new seasons, updates and new rewards. The game keeps, kind of evolving. It's no longer just about finishing something. It's about keeping up.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 6:08

Okay, so just to summarize those first two, there are many opportunities to spend money on those upgrades versus, maybe only paying once for that game cartridge. And if you're my generation, the game cartridges that we had to blow on and put it back in and keep playing. But it seems like what it is now is that somewhat endless cycle, because you can just continue to level up and level up and level up.

Soyoung Park: 6:30

Yes. That's about yes, thats about sums the first of two. And the third difference is the, social structure. So in the past you play alone or with a friend sitting next to you. And now games are deeply connected online. So your child might be a part of guild or team or a competitive sport. They depend on each other and they are scheduled matches or raid or ranking systems. So when a parent says it's time to stop, it may feel to try to like leaving teammates behind. So gaming isn't just play anymore. It's also a kind of a social commitment.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 7:28

Absolutely. Kids want to keep playing and they don't want to disappoint their friends. And that totally makes sense.

Soyoung Park: 7:37

And that leads to the fourth difference which is a psychological design in games. So older games mainly focused on mastery. You played, practice, improved, and you passed the level. But modern games still include mastery. But they also add the kind of urgency like limited item limited time rewards, countdown timers and daily login bonuses. This creates something very powerful, like fear of missing out. It's just, it's not just, “I want to get better,” to children. It becomes, “If I don't log in today, I lose something.” And that sense of urgency changes, how children experience time. Game time is no longer, like, flexible. It feels scheduled and pressured.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 8:41

Y eah. That can help explain why gaming can feel so intense for children. That the fear of missing out, right? The FOMO can be very strong. Can you share what kind of problems this all might create in families?

Soyoung Park: 8:55

I want to start with something very clear. Gaming itself is not automatically harmful. Many children play games regularly and do just fine. They manage school, friendships and family relationships and responsibility without serious gaming problems. However, the World Health Organization W.H.O. recognized something called gaming disorder in their ICD 11. This doesn't mean playing a lot or loving games. It refers to a persistent pattern of gaming behavior. So most importantly, it must create real, real disruption in daily life like less school performance, low quality of relationships, or basic responsibilities and last over time. And even when it doesn't reach that clinical level, families can still experience kind of a tension. So remember what we talked about earlier, the social commitments, the live events and the ranking systems. So for children, turning off the game is no longer neutral. It can feel like breaking a promise to teammates or losing progress.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 10:26

When parents say just turn it off and those children resist. We see that it's not always a simple defiance, right?

Soyoung Park: 10:29

Yes. It often, clashes between family obligations like dinner, homework or bedtimes and digital obligations inside the game world. And families were never designed to negotiate with the 24 hour global servers, countdown timers and live updates. So I would say, when a conflict happens, it's usually not about discipline. It's about families learning how to live with the digital world that never really turns off.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 11:13

Yeah. I mean, you know, it sounds like it's not that we always say, well, they play too much, the game too much. But it's really just how it's all set up. And things that have changed, which is what gets us into those tough situations. Right?

Soyoung Park: 11:27

Yes, exactly. If we keep using all the parenting assumptions for a completely new game, systems, we will continue to feel kind of, confused and frustrated. The parents don't necessarily need strict rules first. They need kind of a new lens. For example, instead of asking, why does my child not just turn it off, we might start asking, what kind of game systems are they participating in? So when we understand how game systems work, we can build kind of smarter, calmer, and more realistic boundaries at home.

Mackenzie DeJong Schelling: 12:15

Yes, I really like that new lens that we can look at it in. With that I know about, this leads us perfectly into next week's topic. So we are going to wrap things up here for now. Hold tight listeners, in our next episode, we'll dive deeper into how that modern game monetization system actually works. And why there's often such a big information gap of those current games. Thank you again, Soyoung for joining us. We look forward, I look so forward to having you back with us in the next one. To our listeners, make sure to hit that follow button so you don't miss it. And come along as we tackle the ups and downs, the ins and outs and the research and reality all around The Science of Parenting.

Anthony Santiago: 13:05

The Science of Parenting is a research based education program hosted by Mackenzie DeJong Schelling, produced and edited by Brock Beirman, with contributions from Barbara Dunn Swanson, Dr. Connie Beecher, Hailey Walker, and Morgan Newell. Send in questions and comments to parenting@iastate.edu, and connect with us on Facebook. This program is brought to you by Iowa State University Extension and Outreach.