Child Development - Why Do We Role-play?

Do you ever ask yourself this question? Do your friends or family ask it instead? Do you have a good answer for them?

What makes so many of us play role-playing games? Is it simply escapism? Do we simply not want to deal with the real world, or is there something else going on?

Why have I already played Final Fantasy XII for over 75 hours? Why do I give up some of my Friday nights to pretend to be a Mage? Why do we choose to spend precious hours of our lives pretending to be other people?

Why do kids play make-believe?

Since I am not an expert on child psychology I decided that I needed to do some research. I found a fascinating article about make-believe on a site devoted to parents who grew up on Sesame Street.

In the article, Lisa Scheer, mother of two examined research by various child development experts. What did these experts find? They found that make-believe is good for children because it acts as their primary method to learn about the world, helps them develop important intellectual skills, and plays an important social function.

It also helps them cope with their anxieties and fears.

What does this have to do with gamers? Well, guess what, you are playing the adult version of make-believe. Did I just crush your dreams? Sorry, but you have to accept it. We are the kids that never grew up.

The article discusses how children use make-believe to learn about their environment. It goes on to talk about how intellectual ideas and symbolic thinking come about as the child grows older. How does a child learn that the number 4 represents four items? They learn it through make-believe. Kids use make-believe as social currency. New kids often try to play parts in the make-believe games of kids that already are playing together.

Have you ever learned something new about some element of life by playing in a role-playing game? Have you ever done research for a character? Have you ever played a video game RPG where ideas about religion, politics, art, or society were present?