A family that plays together... will be ready for arguments
THERE’S no monotony in Monopoly when turf wars begin and Scrabble could often be renamed Squabble.
But doing battle around the kitchen table provides useful training, a German study suggests.
Games played by traditional tribes reflected challenges people faced in real life, researchers found. And they think the same is true today, with sports and even PlayStation shoot-em-ups teaching useful skills.
Researchers studied games played in 25 Pacific cultures. They also looked at how often members hunted together, fought internally and were at war with others.
It emerged that cultures frequently at war tended to play more co-operative games, while those prone to in-fighting played competitive ones. ‘In times of conflict with other cultures, group members have to co-operate. This is reflected in the kinds of games they play,’ said Sarah LeistererPeoples, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.