Racing games 'breed' bad drivers

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6457353.stm

Young people are influenced more easily than older people, and racing
games can influence young drivers, of course it can. So can movies,
commercials, televized races, parents driving badly, and a lot of other
things.

You can't ban sim racing on this basis either, just like you can't ban
hammers because you CAN use it to kill someone.

So we end up where we started: Yes, racing sims may affect young peoples
judgment, but there is nothing we can do about that.

If I have learnt anything from sims it is the opposite of what this
study suggests; racing is something that needs to be performed under
near ideal conditions and among like-minded people. Racing requires such
a staggering amount of concentration that makes it near impossible to
emply racing techniques on public roads.

I would think that youngsters will eventually learn how to cope with
computer games, being able to separate the worlds completely.

I remember one of the extremely fast guys back in the GP2 Racing League
times who was a teenager at that time, started racing karts; he went off
and flipped over so badly that he spent weeks in plaster on his first
outing: So, you learn how to cope with the real world eventually, hehe.

---A---

On 19.03.2007 14:01, cowoffunk wrote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6457353.stm

"Asgeir Nesoen" <asgeir.nesoen (AT) hf (DOT) uio.no> wrote

Young people are influenced more easily than older people, and racing
games can influence young drivers, of course it can. So can movies,
commercials, televized races, parents driving badly, and a lot of other
things.

You can't ban sim racing on this basis either, just like you can't ban
hammers because you CAN use it to kill someone.

So we end up where we started: Yes, racing sims may affect young peoples
judgment, but there is nothing we can do about that.

If I have learnt anything from sims it is the opposite of what this study
suggests; racing is something that needs to be performed under near ideal
conditions and among like-minded people. Racing requires such a staggering
amount of concentration that makes it near impossible to emply racing
techniques on public roads.

I would think that youngsters will eventually learn how to cope with
computer games, being able to separate the worlds completely.

I remember one of the extremely fast guys back in the GP2 Racing League
times who was a teenager at that time, started racing karts; he went off
and flipped over so badly that he spent weeks in plaster on his first
outing: So, you learn how to cope with the real world eventually, hehe.

---A---

I pretty much agree with most of your reply. One fact to realize is that
the vast majority of the younger crowd has had no formal racing experience
at all. I remember an instructor in SCCA driving school when talking about
overtaking saying that when overtaking another car, always assume that the
driver is going to make the most dumb @#$$ed move you can imagine......:-).
Now, 40+ years later this still relates to normal driving. I always assume
that every car out there is going to do the dumbest thing I can imagine and
it relates to me being a much better driver. I would think that virtual
racing would improve reaction times and possibly a bit of knowledge of the
physics of an automobile, but as far as the psycological part of taking it
to the streets...I don't know. I would think that most of the younger folks
realize that this is just a virtual world and not do that. I think that the
BBC article is probably more about the street racing games like NFS rather
than actual racing simulations.

Ed

One thing I find when I put kids on my racing simulator - especially
kids who have only played NFS-type games, is that they have no concept
of having to slow down for a turn. They think you can just go full-
throttle all the time. I doubt very many would take this attitude
into real life driving, but some probably would.

I let my 13 year old nephew and 11 year old son try the F430 mod at
Monaco over the weekend. In both cases they actually did a pretty
good job. But it was still difficult to get them to slow down enough
to go through the turns properly.

Pat Dotson

On Mar 19, 10:42 am, pdot... (AT) mindspring (DOT) com wrote:

One thing I find when I put kids on my racing simulator - especially
kids who have only played NFS-type games, is that they have no concept
of having to slow down for a turn. They think you can just go full-
throttle all the time. I doubt very many would take this attitude
into real life driving, but some probably would.

I let my 13 year old nephew and 11 year old son try the F430 mod at
Monaco over the weekend. In both cases they actually did a pretty
good job. But it was still difficult to get them to slow down enough
to go through the turns properly.

Pat Dotson

That's absolutely what this is about, you're right. There is a vast
difference between a racing game and a racing simulator. The "bounce
off the walls", public road style of racing between "innocent
motorists" versus the closed track competition in a sim where all the
traffic is moving in the same direction and the objective is to finish
well and race well, rather than cause the most amount of damage. When
you have games like Burnout giving monitary totals for each wreck and
glorifying them in slow motion "matrix" style camera modes, of course
kids are going to think they have superb skills when they manage to
weave through the traffic for a whole lap...

I wrote a piece about this earlier today in my blog.
http://www.timwheatley.org/2007/03/1...erous-drivers/

<pdotson (AT) mindspring (DOT) com> wrote

One thing I find when I put kids on my racing simulator - especially
kids who have only played NFS-type games, is that they have no concept
of having to slow down for a turn. They think you can just go full-
throttle all the time. I doubt very many would take this attitude
into real life driving, but some probably would.

I let my 13 year old nephew and 11 year old son try the F430 mod at
Monaco over the weekend. In both cases they actually did a pretty
good job. But it was still difficult to get them to slow down enough
to go through the turns properly.

Pat Dotson

It's BS to think that kids-- no matter how stupid-- would actually think
that sim driving habits would transfer over to real driving success (i.e.,
no accidents, etc.).

Sounds to me like someone is making some wild claims in order to get people
to read something.

Alanb

On Mar 19, 2:52 pm, "Alan Bernardo" <pol... (AT) yalta (DOT) com> wrote:

pdot... (AT) mindspring (DOT) com> wrote in message

news:1174318934.329695.261420 (AT) l75g2000hse (DOT) googlegroups.com...

One thing I find when I put kids on my racing simulator - especially
kids who have only played NFS-type games, is that they have no concept
of having to slow down for a turn. They think you can just go full-
throttle all the time. I doubt very many would take this attitude
into real life driving, but some probably would.

I let my 13 year old nephew and 11 year old son try the F430 mod at
Monaco over the weekend. In both cases they actually did a pretty
good job. But it was still difficult to get them to slow down enough
to go through the turns properly.

Pat Dotson

It's BS to think that kids-- no matter how stupid-- would actually think
that sim driving habits would transfer over to real driving success (i.e.,
no accidents, etc.).

Sounds to me like someone is making some wild claims in order to get people
to read something.

Alanb

Lots of kids have undiagnosed mental problems. This isn't too far out
of the realms of belief. It's not so much believing there is no
consequence, it's about them believing they have skills that they
don't. I remember 10 years ago when I was that age hearing people
saying their reflexes and stuff were so much better because of games
and how cool that was...

On Mar 19, 2:52 pm, "Alan Bernardo" <pol... (AT) yalta (DOT) com> wrote:

pdot... (AT) mindspring (DOT) com> wrote in message

One thing I find when I put kids on my racing simulator - especially
kids who have only played NFS-type games, is that they have no concept
of having to slow down for a turn. They think you can just go full-
throttle all the time. I doubt very many would take this attitude
into real life driving, but some probably would.

It's BS to think that kids-- no matter how stupid-- would actually think
that sim driving habits would transfer over to real driving success (i.e.,
no accidents, etc.).

Sounds to me like someone is making some wild claims in order to get people
to read something.

I agree with the wild claims part. The story is a bunch of BS.
But...

Not sure if your first comments were directed at my response at all.
I can give you a concrete personal example on this very topic: Last
year I bought a Yamaha TTR 90 trail bike for my kids to ride. The
bike has three forward gears. It was a big deal for my kids when I
let them switch to the next higher gear as they got used to riding.

Our first time out at a riding area my 13 year old step daughter was
begging to go into third gear. Well, going fast is easy, just turn
the throttle. It's slowing down that is harder. At the end of the
longest straight was a 90 degree left turn. If you miss the turn you
go straight into the woods. Not 10 minutes went by after telling her
'NO' to third gear when she went screaming past us in third gear
heading straight for the trees. She went way too deep and had no idea
how to get the bike slowed down at that point. Luckily, she grabbed a
handful of front brake and the front wheel washed out. She went down
before getting to the turn.

All this excitement was followed by a trip to the emergency room to
confirm a broken collar bone. She/We got off easy!

The point being, she thought I was an idiot for thinking that she
wasn't capable of going faster. She had no appreciation for the
consequences. That'll teach her

I don't know how old you are Alan, or if you have kids, but there is
no telling what kind of stupid crap they will pull no matter how much
they are warned and taught. I let my kids play NFS on the XBox. No
big deal to me. The best thing you can do is let them get some
experience on a motorized vehicle, be it a motorcycle, karts, or
whatever, before they ever hit the streets in a car.

Pat Dotson

On Mar 20, 5:48 am, Uwe Schürkamp <hoo... (AT) hoover (DOT) dyndns.org> wrote:

May I suggest you were an idiot for buying your kids a freaking
motorcycle in the first place???

No. You may not!

My seven year boy old does really well on that 90. My two 11 year old
boys haven't had any problem either. All three of them play NFS on
the Xbox 360. It probably has a lot do with my having coached them in
baseball and other sports. They are used to following my directions
to some extent.

On the other hand, my step-daugher, who to my knowledge has never
played NFS, is the only one who has had a problem with it. I think it
has more to do with being a stubborn teen-age girl than playing/not
playing video games!

I hope you weren't serious about thinking it's a mistake to put a kid
on a motorcycle. I don't see anything wrong with it at all. One
thing I'm not going to let them do is race karts which I've done for
several years, but I am thinking of putting them in a 1/4 midget car
this year.

Pat Dotson

On Mar 20, 4:48 am, Uwe Schürkamp <hoo... (AT) hoover (DOT) dyndns.org> wrote:

May I suggest you were an idiot for buying your kids a freaking
motorcycle in the first place??? Don't know about you, but in my day and
age, we were content riding our bicycles around the park and making
"vroommm vroomm" noises ;-)

Showing your age there Uwe. Now everybody knows you grew up before
they invented the powered motorcar. ;-)