Survey Says TTRPGs Bring Mental Health, Romance, and Friendship

In a survey of 1,000 TTRPG players in the US, StartPlaying, a tabletop gaming matchup service for professional GMs, found that mental health, romance, and friendships featured highly in the social roles that such games help to facilitate.

With 76% of players saying that TTRPGs have helped them process trauma, 28% indicating that they developed attractions with other players outside the game itself, and 75% crediting games with maintaining their real-life friendships, it seems that roleplaying games have functions beyond those of mere entertainment.

34% of gamers said they had played in a campaign organised for mental health, and the majority find gaming stress-relieving. Indeed, 44% said they played games to relieve stress, 41% said that they did so for mental health support, and 31% to process trauma or for emotional growth (there was, presumably, large overlap between those categories, which is why they add up to more than 100%).

Interestingly, the number of people who met close friends through TTRPGs has been increasing over the decades, with those categorised by the study as 'Boomers' answering that 65% of them made close friends via their hobby, while 78% of 'Gen Z' respondents said the same. Only 5% of people said that RPGs did not help maintain friendships at all.

And when it comes to romance, 44% of respondents dated or are dating (one assumes that includes marriages) somebody they met through gaming.

Of course, this is only a study of TTRPGs, and doesn't necessarily indicate anything special about gaming. We don't know if rock climbers, dog walkers, book clubs, or musicians make more or fewer friends than gamers, or date each other more or less than gamers. It could be that any shared activity has the same effects. Similarly, we don't know if yoga or swimming are more or less helpful when processing trauma than TTRPGs are. Absent that sort of information it's hard to put this study into any kind of context. However, it does present food for thought.

You can check out the full survey results here.

 

[BookTenTiger]

I know it's purely anecdotal but this matches my experiences! I've made both long-term (20+ years) friendships and new friendships (< 1 year) through the hobby. I have a friend who met his wife through our group. D&D definitely helped me get through the ongoing trauma of Covid!

 

[Gradine]

While it's not at all unexpected, it's still really great that we keep having more and more research into the positive benefits of role-playing games.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Definitely a mental health booster.

 

[doctorhook]

Okay gang, let’s begin the romance…

 

[SableWyvern]

How is trauma being defined here? 75% of participants saying they're using roleplaying to deal with trauma sounds like a huge number, to me. Similarly, one third have played in a game that specifically arranged to assist with mental health?

Ah, OK, now that I've looked at the actual results:

• 76% of players said tabletop RPGs have helped them process trauma or emotional growth at least occasionally, while 31% said it’s a key reason they play.

That's very different to saying 76% have used RPGs to process trauma.

A third participating in games specifically set up to assist with mental health plus another 14% currently in such a game still sounds high to me -- that's half of everyone in the survey. Admittedly, I spend very little time in places where I'm going to see LFG posts and requests, but off-hand I can't think of a single instance of seeing a game being advertised with mental health as a goal. The closest would be one or two reddit posts by mental health professionals actually looking for ways to use RPGs as legitimate tools.

 

[The Firebird]

How is trauma being defined here? 75% of participants saying they're using roleplaying to deal with trauma sounds like a huge number, to me. Similarly, one third have played in a game that specifically arranged to assist with mental health?

It doesn't say much about how they found people to survey and I imagine it's not a representative sample. It would be interesting to see how people answered that one by generation. Are people reading mental health as "any socialization is good for my mental health" or "this game will deal with my issues with my parents"?

That said it is hard to find data in this community and it's cool to see them sharing their results.

 

[SableWyvern]

It doesn't say much about how they found people to survey and I imagine it's not a representative sample. It would be interesting to see how people answered that one by generation. Are people reading mental health as "any socialization is good for my mental health" or "this game will deal with my issues with my parents"?

That said it is hard to find data in this community and it's cool to see them sharing their results.

I wouldn't be at all surprised by a large number of people saying games are good for their mental health. The part that surprised me was that a large number of people (50%, even) are saying they've participated in games specifically arranged for that purpose.

I'll be running a Mythras Glorantha game every second Sunday using such and such rules. One of the campaign's key objectives will be to support mental health among the participants.

I doubt that's what people are referring to, because it sounds pretty silly, but I can't think of less silly version, either.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Do you remember the animes where the hero suffers a lot of attacks by the enemy but hw gets up again to continue fighting? To fight like a depression in the real life is something like this, and even I rembember somebody said watching anime helped against depression.

Roleplaying games may help to improve the social skills but it also could be a softer way to face with scars in the health.

 

[SableWyvern]

Digging a bit deeper, it appears that the StartPlaying defines a "cozy" RPG as one designed "specifically for mental health healing". 50% of respondents playing or having played a "cozy" RPG still sounds a bit high to me, but depending on where they sourced their respondants, it's very believable. I'm not convinced that's a great definition of a cozy RPG and it's led to misleading claims, but at least the results make much more sense in that context.