At Spells & Dragons we believe D&D offers so much more than just a fun game with friends and we’re not the only ones who feel this way!

There have been countless studies into the wide ranging benefits of the game; with more and more being published as the resurgence of D&D’s mainstream popularity continues.

Dungeons & Dragons is effective at growing literacy & numeracy skills, increasing prosocial skills, self-confidence, self-efficacy, self-reflection and positive collaboration through relationship building (Jones, 2005).

Many of the game mechanics in D&D, require the player to self-reflect on behalf of their character and continually assess how they wish their character to develop as the story progresses. This playfully facilitates self-reflection and empathy skills. (Clarke, Arnab, Morini, & Heywood, 2019).

Playing D&D puts your creativity into overdrive, utilising imagination, improvisation and inventive solutions to the many challenges a group might face.

Whether it’s convincing a shopkeeper to cut you a deal, casting spells to walk on walls or swinging an axe at a giant orc, playing presents a near endless amount of opportunities for collaboration, conflict resolution and learning about right and wrong.

Studies have shown imaginative role-play gaming structures can function as an engaging, interactive moral training ground, in a medium that promotes moral development (Cole Wright, Weissglass, & Casey, 2017).

For young people especially all of these areas give an opportunity to practice skills that they can transfer into their real world lives. Working as a team, overcoming interpersonal difficulty, standing up for themselves and so much more.

There is no winning or losing in D&D in the traditional sense but failure; just as much as success, is an important part of engaging storytelling. “Through these failures D&D can help children to unlearn and relearn in a subversive nature and to re-contextualize failure as a positive aspect of growth (Sidhu, Carter, & Curwood, 2006)”.

The extent of beneficial learnings this offers young people is boundless. Don’t just take our word for it though, we’ve attached several scientific papers below that reinforce our beliefs in the positive learning opportunities that D&D brings!