New research from the nonprofit Games for Change finds that parents in 2026 hold the same worries about video games — screen time, addiction and inappropriate content — that parents have voiced for the past 50 years, despite these concerns often being at odds with what the research actually shows. The findings matter because they suggest decades of academic and industry efforts to inform parents about gaming have failed to shift public perception, leaving families anxious and potentially limiting positive shared experiences around games.

Research director Rachel Kowert's paper, "Raising Good Gamers: What Families Need to Know About Video Games and Well-Being," analysed nearly 200,000 media articles and social media posts across 15 countries and seven languages, finding negative sentiment towards gaming outweighs positive sentiment by more than five to one (34% versus 6%). Kowert argues gaming's fears have persisted longer than those around books, film or television partly because it is interactive and is frequently, and often wrongly, linked to violent crime. Her research also found nearly 60% of children want to play games with their parents more often, and she proposes a framework called "SPACE" — Show up with curiosity, Play together, Adjust for context, Cultivate digital citizenship, and Establish boundaries together — to help families engage more constructively.