It seems to be generally understood that people engage will engage in motivated reasoning to justify and defend their attitudes and behaviors. With regard to video games in particular, other authors seem to find motivated reasoning phenomena, wherein gamers will believe whatever evidence supports their views and habits (Nauroth, Gollwitzer, Bender, & Rothmund, 2014).

With that in mind, it seems that whether a study reports "biased assimilation" or "wisdom from experience" could be, to some extent, a matter of framing, or perhaps the authors' personal preference. Supporting the possibility that motivated reasoning is at play, the discussion notes that "some individuals who had direct experience with games were more liable to overestimate the [possible] positive and underestimate the possible negative impact of games on young people."

Do you think the current study is able to distinguish between the two accounts?