Children’s perspectives and attitudes towards Fortnite ‘addiction’

Abstract

Playing digital games is increasingly pathologized as an addiction or a disorder, but there is limited research into the impact of game addiction discourse on children who play digital games. In this article, we present results from a study into the digital play of twenty-four 9–14-year-olds, attending to our participants’ perspectives and attitudes towards ‘game addiction’ and how it interacts with their play and identity. Focused primarily on the online multiplayer first-person shooter game Fortnite, we examine how children encounter and attempt to negotiate game addiction discourse and demonstrate how the discourse in and of itself produces challenges for young people whose interests and passions revolve around games. This article subsequently discusses how the discursive frameworks that are perpetuated in the media around ‘problematic play’ need to incorporate and be inclusive of the child’s right to play, and the relevance of our findings to the study of media panic and children’s critical media literacies.

It is Not an Island It’s A World: Fortnite and “Worldness”

“…For the most part our participants described a non-problematic desire to 'unlock' and 'earn' their skins within the allotted time frame, but these comments demonstrate the power that battle passes, and the structure they provide, has in shaping and configuring player experience in Fortnite. As we discuss elsewhere [2], our participants often struggled to negotiate the pervasive media panic about Fortnite as 'addictive' with their normal and healthy desires to play. As Cover [20] has previously discussed, the tension between when something is a hobby enthusiastically engaged in, versus a problematic behavior, is a key characteristic of videogame media panic.…”

“…Similarly, James (13, M) had tried the game once and didn't find it entertaining, but rather just a clone of popular battle royale game PUBG (which he notes, he also doesn't enjoy). There is a discourse around the game, one that is embedded within notions of addiction [2], but it is also more than that.…”

“…In 2018, Fortnite rapidly grew to become one of the world's most popular games, with current estimates of 350 million players [1]. Fortnite's unusual success with younger players was a seismic shift in youth digital gaming cultures, and its massive popularity was accompanied by a global media panic around videogame addiction that saw Fortnite's creator, EPIC Games, called to testify at UK Parliamentary hearings [2].…”

The social dynamics of multiplayer online videogames in Argentinian and Chilean family contexts: The case of Fortnite

“…The researchers found that children negotiate the discourses, which impact on their playing experiences and their identity as players. For instance, children use 'addiction' to describe their usual way of playing, whereas parents use the term 'pathology' to describe it (Carter et al, 2020b). Likewise, the authors propose that incorporating children's viewpoints into these discourses concerning 'problematic play' and their right to play is significant (Apperley, 2015(Apperley, , 2017.…”

“…This idea echoes the Convention on the Rights of the Child's recognition of boys' and girls' right to play (OHCHR, 1990, article Nº31). In other work, Carter et al (2020b) argue that the appeal of Fortnite is linked to its intersection with YouTube and game live streaming, as well as how the game acts as a vehicle for social capital and identity performance, in addition to the rich social experience promoted by the game. These notions allow young people to participate in a vast repertoire of cultural and informational practices concerning the game (Carter et al, 2020b).…”