Siblings play a key role as a gateway into gaming for five- to seven-year-olds, according to KidSay’s latest Trend Tracker, which is due out from the Kansas-based research firm on December 5.

Drawing on data from 1,800 respondents, this new edition in an ongoing series of quarterly reports that the bridge audience is strongly influenced by older brothers and sisters when it comes to developing gaming preferences and behaviors. Compared to their tween/teen counterparts, these kids are 75% more likely to have heard about games they play from a sibling—and they’re also 67% more likely to turn to siblings for information about which games to download next.

Around 20% of both boys and girls in this age bracket said their latest game is a Roblox title, followed by Minecraft. And a majority (71%) of young kids like the convenience of downloading games rather than purchasing them at retail. Overall, 62% of these bridge-age gamers prefer to play on a tablet, followed by consoles (55%) and phones (52%).   

The study also broke down device preferences by gender. Consoles emerged as a top choice for young (47%), tween (54%) and teen (66%) boys. The results were more varied for girls, though, with iPads/tablets ranking highest among the youngest set (42%), and phones being the go-to for tweens (40%) and teens (55%). 

Video games could also be taking up time that used to be reserved for extracurricular activities before the pandemic. This latest Trend Tracker also noted that only 45% of young kids say they are participating in things like team sports, clubs and scouts, compared to 65% in 2018.

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