Video games hold a complicated position in culture and public debate, being both a common pastime among children and adolescents, while simultaneously being a major source of concern among parents, politicians, scholars and interest groups. An intense public debate over video games has run for several decades, and remains a hotly contested area both in the public discourse and among researchers. Parents – who in large part are responsible for managing their children’s use of video games – are thus left without concrete answers, and little support from the state. How do parents find solutions to this challenge? How are these solutions influenced by the public debate of video game risk? And how does industry regulation contribute to, or challenge these practises?
In his doctoral dissertation, Khalid Ezat Azam, demonstrates how parents navigate the question of video game risk by applying strategies and heuristics that reduce uncertainty in an area of life characterized by a lack of definitive answers. Through a combination of survey data from 1001 parent-child dyads (EU Kids Online) and in-depth interviews with 13 sets of Norwegian parents and their children, Azam explores how video game risk as perceived and addressed by parents, interact with broad gender stereotypes, Nordic approaches to parenting, and the role played by foreign industry regulation. Among the findings are that everyday digital parenting practises are a tensioned affair, requiring sometimes counter-intuitive approaches to managing children’s video game use. Azam finds that the stereotyping of boys as “at risk” often leaves girls forgotten, and the risks to them potentially become downplayed.
Moreover, video game age ratings are not a straightforward solution. While these are widely known by parents – forming what Azam calls a kind of “lingua franca” of digital parenting – they are nevertheless highly subject to individual interpretation and even misunderstanding. For example, the European system of game rating (PEGI), which appears on video games boxes sold in Norway, is often confused in parents’ minds with American ratings, which have been transported to a European cultural context through pop culture. This situation, rather than helping parents, has potentially accelerated confusion among families trying to make judgments about what is appropriate for their children.
Azam proposes that future research should emphasize the challenges created by the vast amounts of parallel media age ratings families encounter in their day-to-day media usage, and that “parental guidelines should evaluate how to offer advice that is more inclusive to various family lifestyles”, to aid in improving dialogue within and between families.
Khalid Ezat Azam successfully defended his dissertation on 3 February 2023.
Trial lecture
Designated topic: "From risks to opportunities: A children’s perspective on playing video games"
Evaluation committee
Associate Professor Anne Mette Thorhauge, University of Copenhagen (first opponent)
Dr. Peter Nikken, Hogeschool Windesheim (second opponent)
Professor Taina Bucher, University of Oslo (committee administrator)
Chair of the defence
Head of Department Kjetil Rødje
Supervisors
Professor Elisabeth Staksrud, University of Oslo
Professor Petter Bae Brandtzæg, University of Oslo