Ep. 62 Can Video Games Help Teens Lose Weight?

In this episode ,I  breaks down the science behind active video games. 

Learn how movement-based games can support teen’s journey to a healthier weight—and what really matters for long-term success.

Research mentioned in this episode: 

Comeras-Chueca C, Marin-Puyalto J, Matute-Llorente A, Vicente-Rodriguez G, Casajus J, Gonzalez-Aguero A

Effects of Active Video Games on Health-Related Physical Fitness and Motor Competence in Children and Adolescents With Overweight or Obesity: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

JMIR Serious Games 2021;9(4):e29981

URL: https://games.jmir.org/2021/4/e29981

DOI: 10.2196/29981

If you're wondering…
❓ Why are teens hungry all the time during puberty?
❓ Why are teens craving sugar all the time?
❓ Why teens feel so tired—even when they sleep?

You’re not alone—and it’s not your fault.

Hormones play a HUGE role in how teens gain weight, feel energy, manage emotions, and grow.

Dr Gourgari is a certified pediatric endocrinologist, obesity medicine specialist and health coach for teens.

Each week, she break down how puberty hormones work—and how simple habits like eating better, sleeping more, and moving your body can help you feel better, stronger, and more confident.

We’ll talk about things like:
🥗 Are smoothies really healthy?
🍞 Are carbs bad for weight loss in teens?
💪 And how to stop emotional eating before it takes over your day.

Whether you’re a teen ready to make a change—or a parent looking to support your child the right way—this podcast is for you.

🎁 Want to jump in right now?
Grab your free guide: 30 Healthy, High-Protein Recipes for Teens at lifestyleforteens.com/recipes

Transcript

 Hello, welcome to another episode of the Lifestyle and Weight Loss for Teens podcast. This is Dr. Jenny Gourgari and on today's episode, I will be talking about the importance of video games into maintaining a healthier lifestyle, which sounds a little weird in the beginning, doesn't it? We know that American Academy of Pediatrics recommends  two hours of screen time and the reason is because a lot of times kids use the video games for longer periods and they end up spending sanitary lifestyle. They are in the couch, they're watching video games, and they're not moving around. I. Decided to do this podcast because recently I was talking with one of my teenagers and they asked me if it was okay to continue to use screen time, like video games, but they were using one of those video games that encouraged them to dance while they were watching video games.

And he asked me, is it still okay to play that game because I am Actively playing and moving when I'm playing this video game. I wanted to look into what's the scientific evidence and is it actually true that some of those video games that we call them active video games, can actually help teenagers in their pathway to get to a healthier weight?

Now what are those active video games I mentioned before the example of the dance. So there are video games that teenagers plays while they're dancing. There can be virtual video games where they are making other moves or they're picking basketball or they're running or they're doing all fighting or other sorts of movement.

And sometimes you can also have that with virtual reality games where they think they're in the field, they're playing, so they're actively moving. There was a great study that was done and the. Title of this manuscript. I will put it in the show notes. But it's actually effects of active video games on health related physical fitness and motor competence in children adolescents with overweight or obesity. 

So what the researchers did in this study is they put together data from many other different studies, and then they looked to see whether teenagers that were using active video games had better results in terms of their body mass index. 

If you dunno what body mass index, I invite you to go and check out episode one of the podcasts where I go and explain what is body mass index and how to figure out how much weight a teenager needs to lose to get to a healthy weight. 

So they examine whether video games improve the body mass index, but also whether they improve the percent body fat because we know it's not only about the weight, but it's also about improving their overall body fat.

They put more than 15 articles together that met  strict criteria. What they found was that kids that had participation in active video games compared with kids that were not playing active video games had better association in terms of their body mass index and in terms of their body fat percentage. So this is a very helpful study that gives us a signal that potentially using active video games can be better than using video games without activity or not doing anything at all. 

Now we have to think about this also a step forward, right? This study is not to say that playing video games is better than going out on the field playing basketball or participating with your friends in volleyball, or playing with your friends in other activities or going swimming or all of this, right? So this study did not compare the active video games with actual physical activity. In my opinion, the active physical activity is still the best way to get active because it's not only about movement but it's also about, learning other skills with active physical activity, like collaboration with your friends, going out in nature, being exposed to light. Getting enough hydration and nutrition and all those things, but this study gives an important message in terms of if you are going to spend this hour watching video games anyway, it's better to at least choose a video game that makes you be active rather than have a video game that makes you sit there and do nothing. 

It's something to consider, like when you are trying to make small changes and get into your ideal weight, there are little choices that you need to make and change does not happen all of a sudden if you are not willing to give up video games but are willing to make healthier changes, then that may be a smart solution in the beginning. Consider that if you are one of the teenagers that spends more than two hours video games, can you make a small swap and choose something that makes your body more active?

Another thing that is important is that when they looked at those studies, they did  find  a decrease in the fat mass, but did not find increase in the muscle mass. this is another important difference between physical activity particularly strength training exercise compared to video games. we know that building more muscle is important for good hormonal regulation, particularly in puberty. 

you can go and listen to previous episodes where I talk about the importance of building muscle and why it's important for teenagers.

if you wanna increase your muscle mass, overall endurance, then you should incorporate some physical activity particularly muscle strength training. 

Another thing that this research found is that they did not find a decrease in circumference. Researchers use weight circumference as an indirect measurement to measure belly fat. And why do we care about belly fat? Because it's the part of the fat that produces more inflammation in the body. It's more harmful than body fat that is in other areas. It can cause inflammation in the liver. It can cause higher risk for future stroke and heart disease, it can cause higher risk for diabetes. So we wanna pay attention to belly fat and we wanna pay attention to things that overall decrease the belly fat. And again, I have talked about what teenagers can do to decrease their belly in previous episodes. So I invite you to go and check those out. 

But again, this is another take home message that active video games do not totally replace the beneficial effects of physical activity when it comes to talking about comparing benefits of active video games versus physical activity.

So my take home message is to set a goal.

First of all, are you watching video games  more than two hours every day? or are you just spending more than two hours per day watching videos or YouTube or other things? And if that's the case, are you willing to make a swap and include, let's say 30 minutes, three times a week instead of sitting down, be involved in some kind of video game that is active video game and keep it up like with different topics, like there are many different games that you can play, so don't use the same thing.

Similar to us with physical activity that people can get tired and give up physical activity that they don't like. When they are involved with a video game that's always the same, they're more likely to give it up. So choose active video games and alternate them every month, or every week or every day, don't do the same thing.

So that will keep you more engaged and that will increase the chances that you will keep moving and, try to save different video games are talking to different parts of your body. Like for example, if one active video game is showing you how to play tennis, that is mainly controlling muscle movements on the upper arms.

Then you can control and find another game that may be soccer that controls more the lower parts of your body legs. 

 I hope this was helpful. Again, it's not about doing something that you are likely to give up after a few weeks or even days. It's about making little swaps on those daily habits and making this more successful for your overall wellbeing. Now, if you want to stay in touch and you never miss an episode, go to lifestyle fourteens.com/newsletter, sign up and you'll get my weekly emails with more tips so we can stay in touch. And feel free to reach out to me with any questions or topics that you'd like me to talk in future episodes.

Take care and I'll talk to you next week. Bye.