Exploring Parental Involvement in Esports: Perspectives from Parents and Children

Abstract

Esports are organised competitive video gaming, with millions of global participants. Despite its growing popularity esports remains a contentious topic in households, particularly the role of parents within esports. Parental concerns towards esports such as health concerns, academic balance, and career uncertainty are often legitimate. Parents play a critical role in shaping young players access, attitudes and engagement within esport. Integrating parents into the esports ecosystem can provide benefits which include improving player well-being, sustainable participation and stronger support structures. Excluding parents may reinforce misunderstandings, limit opportunities for young players, and hinder the ecosystem’s social legitimacy. This study, therefore, examines not only why parental involvement matters, but also the roles parents currently occupy within esports, and the forms of support needed to enable constructive engagement. Parents often express negative views of esports, such as reduced academic performance, and unhealthy lifestyles. These views can create conflict within the parent-child relationship. Previous research has mainly focused on either children’s or parents’ perspectives without addressing the importance of exploring both, to fully understand the parent–child relationship. To understand this relationship, the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) was identified as a useful framework. Applying this theory to esports helps explain how both parents’ and children’s intentions influence esports participation. TPB is widely used within sports; however, its application to esports remains underexplored. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the parent–child relationship among children who engage in esports, to capture the perspectives of both parents and children, and to identify the support they need to make parents part of the esports ecosystem. Eighteen participants comprising of both parents and children contributed to the study, who were interview separately (10 males, 8 females). All participants were based in the UK at the time of data collection. Interviews were semi-structured and followed an interview guide, based on insights in the relevant literature and research questions. All interviews were transcribed and used for reflexive thematic analysis. The results revealed two distinct sets of perspectives from parents and children. From the children’s point of view, gaming is used as a tool for social interaction. Children’s perspectives also included peer pressure, different approaches to gameplay by gender, parental control, and awareness of the negative aspects of gaming, these were identified as significant experiences and insights. This finding indicates that esports plays a complex role in children’s lives. From the parents’ perspectives on children’s engagement within esports, the findings demonstrate their focus on control, concern, and the need for educational support, and these were identified as significant. Parents expressed a need for an educational support to help understand the phenomenon of esports, since they were aware of their knowledge gaps and wished to learn more about esports. The children expressed a strong desire for their parents to receive educational support to understand esports, which is an original finding. Using the framework of the Theory of Planned Behaviour illustrates that parents are gatekeepers and have a direct impact on their children’s engagement in esports. Therefore, the findings from this thesis highlight the importance of parents moving beyond passive observation, as their active involvement can encourage a more supportive environment. The result of the thesis provides significant implications for both literature and practice, by expanding our understanding of parents’ and children’s perspectives and needs, and by offering empirical evidence to inform the development of educational interventions for both groups.