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Health, Wellbeing and Games

This report summarises the discussions of the 6th European Video Games Society workshop on Health, Wellbeing and Games, held on 23 August 2022 at Devcom (Köln, Germany).

Workshop 6, Health, Wellbeing and Games; 23 August 2022, held during the DEVCOM Conference in Cologne, Germany. 23 stakeholders joined the sixth workshop of the European Video Games Society, an initiative of the European Commission to support the video games ecosystem. The project, run by consultant companies Ecorys and KEA, aims to inform policy making on the impact of video games in various areas, identify ways for the EU to actively support the sector, and foster an active community in the ecosystem. The sixth workshop addressed the importance of video games in relation to players’ Health and Wellbeing. Section title: Games encouraging movement. Playing games can promote movement and physical wellbeing, and can also be a source of relaxation providing emotional support and stress relief. Immersive and extended reality applications (VR/XR) in look particularly promising in this area. Section title: Games as a space for mental health and social connections. Games support players and their mental wellbeing. They offer escapism, self-discovery and expression. Games can also help forming strong personal connections and friendship. Games are powerful ‘empathy machines’ that can put players in somebody else’s shoes demystifying conditions and generating understanding. Companies should be more open to share data with researchers to conduct studies on long term effects of games in mental health, as more research and hard data is needed. Section title: Finding the right balance for virtual play. Players often face online hate speech and toxic behaviour: although 70% of gamers experience toxic behaviours online, only 10% report it. Although companies are starting to act and protect their players from negative experiences, holistic approaches with regulators, industry actors and online communities are needed. Players should be informed on how to report harassment during their online experience. More workshops and interviews will be soon organised by the European Video Games Society. You can contribute to our survey via the following link: https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/EUGamingSociety For more information on the project or for future participation, please reach out to EUvideogames@ecorys.com and check out https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/value-gaming

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Workshop 6 - Summary (.pdf)
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Workshop 6 - Visual summary (.jpg)
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Last update

30 January 2023

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