Peer-Reviewed Study Says Dungeons & Dragons Good for Mental Health

A study published in Games for Health Journal Vol 13, No 2 titled A Study on the Efficacy of the Tabletop Roleplaying Game Dungeons & Dragons for Improving Mental Health and Self-Concepts in a Community Sample by Alyssay Merrick, Wendy Wen Li, and Dan J. Miller shows mental health benefits of tabletop roleplaying games.

Twenty-five participants played Dungeons & Dragons for one hour per week for eight weeks with surveys before, during, and after the game sessions. All participants played the same module run by a local games club in Queensland, Australia, and were balanced across prior experience with D&D with 16% having no experience, 32% moderate experience, and 20% a “great deal” of experience.

According to the study, “Participants demonstrated significant decreases in depression, stress, and anxiety and significant increases in self-esteem and self-efficacy over the study period”. The paper states that the results indicate D&D and other RPGs “may have potential utility as a wellbeing intervention or prevention program”.

A free version of the paper published by the authors is available in PDF format

 

[Umbran]

Also, I'd like to see a control group that spent an hour on unstructured social interactions for comparison.

All else being equal, isn't a few hours spent hanging out and having fun with friends each week going to be good for your mental health, regardless of whether or not you play a TTRPG?

(emphasis mine)
Well, therein lies a big question.

Is the game serving as a structure that allows the social activity to have positive effect without having pre-established relationships?

 

[GMMichael]

Exactly. There are lots of studies showing that chess after school is good for children's grades. But when they did a broader study, they found that it was just having an after school activity that was good, and chess wasn't better than anything else.

It wouldn't surprise me to hear that chess actually does make kids smarter. Unlike the large quantities of games that rely heavily on chance and opinion.

(I'm sorry, Cards Against. You're still hilarious.)

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

It wouldn't surprise me to hear that chess actually does make kids smarter. Unlike the large quantities of games that rely heavily on chance and opinion.

(I'm sorry, Cards Against. You're still hilarious.)

There are different kinds of "smarter" and chess is probably not helping as much with social awareness and interaction skills or calculating probabilities as, say, poker does.

 

[Rhineglade]

The only issue I foresee is the chance that it becomes a crutch and is relied on too heavily in order to escape what troubles us rather than dealing with the issue directly. D&D is a fantastic stress-reliever but like all things can become overused and abused in my opinion.

 

[MGibster]

I cringe at the tiny sample size.

Yeah, twenty-five people is a teeny, tiny sample. I kind of want to chalk this up to a study that should appear in "Duh" magazine because it seems obvious. We're social creatures, and when we engage in a recreational activity with others we're socializing and building bonds which can contribute to improving or maintaining our mental wellbeing. Still, it's good to have emperical data even if more study is warranted given the limitations of this particular project.

 

[Umbran]

Yeah, twenty-five people is a teeny, tiny sample.

Twenty five people who all went to the same game club, no less. That's not speaking to a broad diversity of experience at all.

 

[ninjayeti]

This study was clearly funded by Big Gaming.

 

[Gradine]

Participants were recruited through external sources, including participants with zero experience, and they ran an analysis based on the number of factors using a popular open-source statistical power analysis tool to determine that 24 participants was a large enough sample size to demonstrate statistical significance along the factors they were measuring. They also, like any good study, include a section on the limitations of the study and suggestions for expanded studies in the future, including control groups and larger sample sizes to factor larger demographic controls.

Like yes, this is a "in other news, water remains wet" conclusion, but it's a solid study laying the foundation for future replicability.

 

[Celebrim]

Yeah, twenty-five people is a teeny, tiny sample. I kind of want to chalk this up to a study that should appear in "Duh" magazine because it seems obvious. We're social creatures, and when we engage in a recreational activity with others we're socializing and building bonds which can contribute to improving or maintaining our mental wellbeing. Still, it's good to have emperical data even if more study is warranted given the limitations of this particular project.

I immediately wanted to share this on my social media feed, but then I realized the science is so sloppy that my science friends would mock me for it.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Participants were recruited through external sources, including participants with zero experience, and they ran an analysis based on the number of factors using a popular open-source statistical power analysis tool to determine that 24 participants was a large enough sample size to demonstrate statistical significance along the factors they were measuring. They also, like any good study, include a section on the limitations of the study and suggestions for expanded studies in the future, including control groups and larger sample sizes to factor larger demographic controls.

Like yes, this is a "in other news, water remains wet" conclusion, but it's a solid study laying the foundation for future replicability.

It's the D&D equivalent of sending the Rouge/Ranger to scout ahead. Do a small study to check if it's worth pursuing on a larger scale.

Hopefully, future studies can go larger and more in depth.

It's a small victory, but a victory none the less.