Fundamental Flaws in the Design and Reporting of Chew and Neo (2024)

Loot boxes are products inside video games that consumers can buy to obtain random rewards. They are prevalently implemented in contemporary video games, including in those deemed suitable for young children. Stakeholders (parents and policymakers) are concerned about their gambling-like nature and potential harms. An established line of research has found positive correlations between loot box spending and problem gambling and problem video gaming that justify stricter regulation. Chew and Neo (2024) also sought to explore these relationships and presented findings that were contrary to the prior literature. In principle, challenging our current knowledge using novel methods can improve the overall reliability of science and should always be encouraged. However, those methods must be sound. Unfortunately, Chew and Neo (2024) was fundamentally flawed due to a major error in its survey materials: in relation to the most important variable, they incorrectly instructed participants that the highly popular video game League of Legends did not contain loot boxes, which was factually incorrect, as the game did sell loot boxes. This significantly affected the accuracy of the data and the subsequent results and interpretation. Besides this fundamental error, the study also suffers from several other critical shortcomings that call its validity into question, including (i) measuring and relying upon an unreliable variable, (ii) potentially unjustified exclusion of participants, and (iii) the misuse of statistics. More proactive engagement with open science practices would have alleviated our concerns or even prevented these issues from arising in the first place. Our analyses suggest that the validity of the results in Chew and Neo (2024) may have been compromised and should be interpreted with caution for meta-analysis and policymaking purposes. © The Author(s) 2025