UNEMPLOYMENT, particularly among young men, is on the rise and experts are looking to find the source of the issue.
Statistics show that in early 2024 around 900k young people in the UK were not in education, employment or training, an increase of around 90k from last year.
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Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride made statements blaming video games for this increase in unemployment, saying: “For boys, things like gaming is a prevalent factor [in unemployment.]”
He claims that young people have seen: “a very marked increase in mental health [conditions], which is very worrying not least because they are young people with futures ahead of them”.
Stride is not the first person to point the finger at video games for the world’s problems, though these comments place a strong correlation between gaming, unemployment and mental health.
Luckily, there have been a number of studies surrounding the topic to give us a better idea as to whether these comments hold any weight.
A 2022 Oxford University study found that young people who spent a large portion of leisure time playing games saw no negative effects on their mental well-being.
However, there is a change in these findings when it comes to how young people relate to gaming during a period of unemployment.
In 2022, the University of Florida found that using video games as a form of escapism during a period of unemployment had a negative effect on well-being.
However, those who use it as a way to regain control claimed it had a positive effect on their well-being.
It seems that increased gaming time could have a negative or positive effect on young people’s well-being but it will depend on how they engage with their gaming time.
Taking the question of well-being out of the picture we can focus on whether gaming hurts or helps job prospects.
There are a number of studies pointing to the latter, with gamers obtaining a number of desirable ‘soft skills’ via their playtime.
Soft skills are those that people can’t gain a qualification in, such as time management, ability to delegate, and the ability to follow instructions effectively.
A report by ManPowerGroup identified a number of soft skills that gaming can offer and how they can improve employment prospects.
The report reads: “Gaming cultivates not only technical skills but also the soft skills that are increasingly valuable as automation and machines perform more routine tasks.
“Gamers bring improved critical thinking, creativity, emotional intelligence and complex problem-solving to the table. Games even teach players how to communicate feedback effectively.
“These soft skills are hard to find and even harder to train — 43 percent of employers say it is more difficult to teach the soft skills they’re looking for.”
This report is backed up by a 2022 University of Sussex study of over 16k participants which found that people in the same careers developed the same soft skills by playing similar games.
Lead author of the study Dr Anna-Stiina Wallinheimo says: “In recruitment processes, the best candidates may be missed because organisations do not consider the soft skills that have been gained through non-work activities (for example, online gaming).
“As a result of our research, we believe applicants’ online gaming experiences should be highlighted because these acquired soft skills can really help to develop their all-round strengths for the job at hand.”
So studies show that gaming while unemployed can lead to better mental well-being, and the development of skills that can lead to employment.
However, it doesn’t answer the question of whether unemployed gamers are spending too much time on their hobbies rather than applying for jobs.
There are relatively few studies on this phenomenon, and the information we do have is inconclusive.
A 2016 study from the University of Chicago found that young men with high school level education or lower were more likely to turn to gaming rather than employment, but this is a trend that is in line with the economic crisis.
The same study found that young men with a university level of education didn’t see the same increase in gaming, though attributes this to the fact that this group finds getting jobs easier.
Studies like this seem to indicate that young men are turning to gaming at times of unemployment to deal with their stress rather than remaining unemployed to stay home and game.
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The only thing we can say for certain is that there is no conclusive evidence that gaming has an effect on unemployment or well-being, only that young people are turning to gaming to cope with the current difficulty in finding work.
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