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Volume 32, Number 1 | 2019\u003Cbr>Social Policy Report |\n| --- | --- | --- |\n\nDigital Games as a Context for Children’s Cognitive  \nDevelopment: Research Recommendations and Policy Considerations  \nFran C. Blumberg, Fordham University  \nKirby Deater-Deckard, University of Massachusetts-Amherst  \nSandra L. Calvert, Georgetown University  \nRachel M. Flynn, Northwestern University  \nC. Shawn Green, University of Wisconsin-Madison  \nDavid Arnold, University of Massachusetts-Amherst  \nPatricia J. Brooks, College of Staten Island & The Graduate Center, CUNY  \nABSTRACT  \nWe document the need to examine digital game play and app use as a context for cognitive development, particularly during middle childhood. We highlight this developmental period as 6-through 12-year olds comprise a large swath of the preadult population that plays and uses these media forms. Surprisingly, this age range remains understudied with regard to the impact of their interactive media use as compared to young children and adolescents. This gap in knowledge about middle childhood may reflect strong and widely held concerns about the effects of digital games and apps before and after this period. These concerns include concurrent and subsequent influences of game use on very young children’s and adolescents’ cognitive and socioemotional functioning. We highlight here what is currently known about the impact of media on young children and adolescents and what is not known about this impact in middle childhood. We then offer recommendations for the types of research that developmental scientists can undertake to examine the efficacy of digital games within the rapidly changing media ecology in which children live. We conclude with a discussion of media policies that we believe can help children benefit from their media use. Our hope is that this review will foster greater investigation of the cognitive socialization, as raised over 20 years ago by developmental psychologist and early games researcher Patricia Greenfield, that digital games serve during the middle childhood period, and childhood more generally.  \nCorresponding author:  \nFran C. Blumberg ( [blumberg@fordham.edu](blumberg@fordham.edu) )  \nAuthor’s note:  \nThe authors thank Kristen Kohm for her insight and contributions to the content presented here.  \nSocial Policy Report | 1  \nSocial Policy Report  \nVolume 32, Number 1 | 2019 ISSN 1075-7031  \nSocial Policy Report is published four times a year by the Society for Research in Child Development.  \nEDITORIAL TEAM  \nLead Editor  \nEllen Wartella, PhD  \n[ellen-wartella@northwestern.edu](ellen-wartella@northwestern.edu)  \nAssociate Editor  \nFashina Aladé, PhD  \n[alade@u.northwestern.edu](alade@u.northwestern.edu)  \nEditorial Board  \nP. Lindsay Chase-Lansdale, PhD Sandra Waxman, PhD David Figlio, PhD Craig Garfield, MD Neil Jordan, PhD Terri Sabol, PhD David Uttal, PhD Diane Schanzenbach, PhD Dedre Gentner, PhD Matthew M. Davis, MD Amelie Petitclerc, PhD Rachel Flynn, PhD  \nSRCD Policy Staff  \nMartha Zaslow, PhD Patricia Barton, MPP Anna Kimura  \nScience Writer  \nAnne Bridgman  \nManager of Publications  \nChris Asher  \nFROM THE EDITOR  \nIt is nearly a cliché to say that today’s children are living in a media saturated environment. We hear countless anecdotal reports of parents giving their toddlers iPads and smartphones to keep them engaged and amused. Nationally representative surveys conducted over the last several years have consistently shown us that children are surrounded by many digital products and begin engaging with them at very early ages. With this Social Policy Report, the authors—a group of renowned developmental psychologists from across the country, led by Fran Blumberg of Fordham University and Kirby Deater-Deckard of University of Massachusetts Amherst—provide a wide-ranging and comprehensive review of a very popular medium for children: digital games. Moreover, they address the critical question o","cbCaip43UYuzZBoU","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaip43UYuzZBoU","pdf",204742,33,"English","# Abstract\n# Editorial Team\n## Lead Editor\n## Associate Editor\n## Editorial Board\n# From the Editor\n# Social Policy Report Details","[{\"question\":\"Why does the report focus on middle childhood ages 6–12?\",\"answer\":\"Middle childhood is presented as a key period because many children play digital games and use apps, yet this age range is described as understudied compared with younger children and adolescents.\"},{\"question\":\"What gap in knowledge does the report highlight?\",\"answer\":\"The report emphasizes that evidence about how interactive media affects cognitive and socioemotional functioning during middle childhood is limited, leaving uncertainty relative to findings from other age groups.\"},{\"question\":\"What recommendations does the report make for future research and policy?\",\"answer\":\"It recommends specific types of research developmental scientists can conduct to test the efficacy of digital games in a rapidly changing media environment, and it concludes with policy considerations intended to help children benefit from media use.\"}]","Digital Games as a Context for Children’s Cognitive Development - Volume 32 - Policy Considerations | PDF",1792058106,83]