I'll partly agree with Hal and partly disagree. I'd argue that some games could separate you from the real world and leave you feeling isolated, but many of the MMOs out there inspire a feeling of community and meeting up with fellow players. Course, I've had a hard time getting a team to take me on in City of Heroes, so maybe social outcasts will start being that everywhere now.

From the article:

Hal Halpin, president of the Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA) has taken issue with a study recently released by Save the Children, a British non-profit.

The organization surveyed teachers, more than 70% of whom worried that video games were causing children to become socially isolated. One-third felt that kids were experiencing lonliness and had difficulty in making new friends. Save the Children representative Lorna Redden said:

This research is showing that use of Internet chatrooms, mobile phone games and that kind of technology is making it harder for children to interact with each other.

What children do outside school does have an impact. If you’re just sitting in front of a computer screen when you go home from school, it is not going to help you interact with friends when you go to school.

Read the full article over at gamepolitics.com