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The Internet Games Entertainment Technology

Study Casts Doubt On Value of WHO's 'Gaming Disorder' Diagnoses (arstechnica.com) 46

Posted by BeauHD from the psychological-issues dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Since the World Health Organization proposed new diagnoses for "hazardous gaming" and "gaming disorder" last year, there's been an ongoing scientific debate about which way the causation for these issues really goes. Does an excessive or addictive relationship with gaming actually cause psychological problems, or are people with existing psychological problems simply more likely to have an unhealthy relationship with gaming? A recent study by Oxford's Internet Institute, published in the open access journal Clinical Psychological Science, lends some support to the latter explanation. But it also highlights just how many of the game industry's most devoted players may also be driven by some unmet psychological needs.

To study how so-called "dysfunctional gaming" relates to psychological needs and behaviors, the Oxford researchers surveyed a nationally representative sample of 1,004 UK adolescents and their caregivers. They asked the caregivers to evaluate their adolescents' levels of "psychosocial functioning:" how well the adolescents are able to internalize or externalize problems in their lives as evidenced by their behavior. [...] Of the 1,004 adolescents surveyed, 525 said they played online games daily for an average of about three hours per day. Among that group, over 55% showed at least one of the nine indicators for Internet Gaming Disorder, and even 23% showed at least three indicators. Those reported "dysregulated gaming" effects showed a significant positive correlation with the amount of time spent playing, as well as a significant negative correlation with the reported psychosocial evaluations from caregivers. In other words, those with "dysregulated" gaming habits were more likely to spend more time playing each day and less likely to be able to handle problems in their lives in a healthy way. Crucially, though, the measured effect of the dysregulated gaming variable in the study "accounted for a practically insignificant share of variability in key outcomes... as compared with the role played by basic psychological needs," as the study authors write. "This evidence suggests that having information about the extent to which an adolescent's video-game play is dysregulated provides no practically useful incremental information when viewed in light caregivers' assessments of emotional, behavioral, peer, or conduct difficulties."

"So while so-called adolescent 'problem gamers' are more likely to show behavioral problems, that fact in and of itself is much less important in predicting those problems than other measures of whether those adolescents' psychological needs are being met," reports Ars Technica. "That suggests that both dysregulated gaming and psychosocial behavior problems are both potential signs of more fundamental underlying psychological frustrations rather than excessive gaming causing problems in and of itself."
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Study Casts Doubt On Value of WHO's 'Gaming Disorder' Diagnoses More

Study Casts Doubt On Value of WHO's 'Gaming Disorder' Diagnoses

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  • We are addicted to endless studies

    • It's because people now hate the idea of free will. If you're a fuck-up it's not because you're a fuck-up, it's some disorder.

      For a prime example, see the fat acceptance/healthy-at-any size lunatics. They can't accept their own fault for their condition so instead they want to try to alter the reality (muh hormones! muh PCOS! muh processed food!) around them.

      • Body acceptance seems to be an important movement for some females, but most guys are much too sexy for their shirt to even be bothered by such inane studies or social movements.

        • I'll take "body acceptance" serious as soon as I see one of these fat ladies deliberately go out of their way to go out with a fat guy instead of swooning over that muscular one.

          • Asking us to "not attack and shame fat people and push them away from society" is not the same as asking us to "accept that it is healthy to be fat." They know it isn't healthy. The request is to avoid mocking them for it in so many of our social interactions, which is what happens today.

            And, of course, there's a pretty wide range of healthy that isn't acknowledged. Accepting that is also part of the request.

            • Not really. It's pretty mainstream FA to deny science. "You can't tell someone's health by their weight!". Yes, if you are 400lb I can. If you are 150lb I probably can't.

              See also CICO denialism, misinterpretation of bad studies like the Biggest Loser studies to claim it's almost impossible to lose weight (it's unlikely due to people's choices, not any physiological reason), See twitter activists upset about ads truthfully (and respectfully, to your point) pointing out that obesity causes many cancers. See

              • Just because there's a massive disinformation campaign doesn't negate that there was a real and (in my opinion) valid request for a behavior change that started the movement, a request that still is generally ignored. Yes, the vocal advocates have gone way over the line on science denial. Responding by saying that "because there is science denial therefore there was no legitimate request in the first place" makes the same error that they do but in the other direction.

                • What behavior? Not throwing rotten tomatoes or jeering at fat people in public? Sure, I can get on board those are bad things. Considering what a large % of us are fat, that's really not so much an issue these days, you'd run out of rotten tomatoes or clever ways to call people fatties.

                  Letting them take up 2 seats on an airplane, legally mandated for free? Forcing public places to have steel reinforced chairs with no arms? Treating 450lb people as a protected class you can't fire because they miss work so m

                  • Re: (Score:2)

                    by Xenx ( 2211586 )
                    Your opinion on fat people missing work is bollocks. Medical leave is medical leave, regardless of the reason behind it. There are plenty of medical reasons to miss work that are entirely avoidable. Pregnancy is avoidable, sports injuries are avoidable, etc. The only way to be fair about medical leave protection is to allow all or allow none.

                    • Problem is, employers are not fair. You're a young woman who just got married and gets all "awwwww" when someone walks by with a baby stroller? Be prepared to be number one on the layoff list. Of course not because you're prone to be pregnant and a liability but because of ... financial reasons. Gimme 5 minutes and I'll come up with some other bullshit reason.

                      You're 250 pounds and show no plans to change that to less? Go shake hands with the other woman who likes to have a belly.

                    • Re: (Score:2)

                      by Xenx ( 2211586 )
                      That reason does have to hold up in court if the ex-employee fights it. I'm not saying every ex-employee would fight it, or that every excuse wouldn't hold up in court. But, a potential court case is definitely a deciding factor in whether to drop someone over potential ADA/FMLA concerns.

                      But still, we come back to my original point. There are plenty of reasons a person could be out on medical leave that are entirely the fault of the person on leave. There is no fucking reason to discriminate against one or
                  • There's some important milestones in between the two extremes of rotten tomatoes and protected class. High school girls still have very high rates of bulimia and similar eating disorders that can be traced to all the pressure to conform to one particular body type. And there's a strong hiring bias against women who are not the classic airline stewardess body form. Similar bias, albeit to a lesser extent, exists against men.

                    The body acceptance movement is about all the lower milestones that still have yet

                    • High school girls still have very high rates of bulimia and similar eating disorders that can be traced to all the pressure to conform to one particular body type.

                      Its the women that put that pressure on, not men. Sure, a guy doesnt find a 300lb women attractive, but thats not pressure. Women on the other hand, are fucking nasty to one another.

                      And before you go there, women make the vast majority of spending decisions in the U.S. They are the drivers of what advertising is.

                    • The question of who applies more pressure is irrelevant. If men are applying undue pressure and filtering women out of jobs or other economic opportunities which they would otherwise qualify for, they should stop, even if women are continuing pressure separately.

                      Another person doing worse evil doesn't excuse me doing lesser evil.

            • Asking us to "not attack and shame fat people and push them away from society" is not the same as asking us to "accept that it is healthy to be fat." They know it isn't healthy.

              Not really, there are no bans on so called "plus size" models who feature prominently in advertisement (after their cellulite was removed via Photoshop), while there are bans for models who are too slim [bbc.com], because that is unhealthy. Clearly a double standard and a dumb one too.

              • It's not a double standard. There's never been a problem with advertisers pushing people to be too fat. There have been considerable problems with pushing people to be too thin. The law correctly addresses the problem, not a hypothetical that doesn't occur.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        Nope, genetics have a huge impact on our bodies and minds, as will diet and toxic pollution and of course abuse in childhood often as a direct result of state sponsored abuse ie being born in a poor house hold as a child means you are vermin and deserve to suffer, hunger and physical discomfort and even abuse, until you prove your worth pay you debt for being born, as a slave should.

        These all impact psychological behavioural outcomes, straight off the bat, psychopathy general average statistic, 1% of popul

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      That's science. A study is not conclusive until everyone has piled on and failed. Likewise a refutation of a study is inconclusive until it too has run the gantlet.

      In this case, where things went awry is the inclusion in public recommendations of study conclusions that had not been thoroughly vetted by adversarial process. That happens sometimes.

      This is why scientists speak in elaborate circumlocutions when you try to pin them down on some public issue. They're not afraid of what the unwashed masses wil

  • ...People that engage in anything can become depressed or anxious or none of the above?

    As time moves forward and humans do different things, we seem to have an addiction to calling everything an addiction. Cell phones? We're all addicted. Internet? We're addicted. Too much gaming? Addicted. How about if you work on your car too much? Or if you spend excessive hours at the office? Everyone's an addict in the eyes of grad students. If this is true it seems that this should simply be called "The

    • >Everything in moderation is most helpful over time for humans.

      Unless you want to put a few years in to become really good at something.

  • So what they're saying is that people who escape from reality and engage in fantasy to an unhealthy degree may be doing so because of some underlying problem with their reality? I'm glad we got that straightened out.

  • 41 Years (Score:3)

    by TechyImmigrant ( 175943 ) on Tuesday October 22, 2019 @06:36PM (#59337110) Homepage Journal

    I've been playing computer games for 41 years. Computer games are an excellent pass time.
    I must be horribly messed up by now, rather than a successful late-career engineer and author with wife, grown family and no criminal record.

    The anti-games research has been coming for decades and each time it get debunked by real data. This round is no different.

    • This round points its finger directly at the WHO as an organization that puts politics above science.

      • >This round points its finger directly at the WHO as an organization that puts politics above science.

        Totally. Check out their nutrition recommendations made by a panel of almost exclusively vegetarian doctors.
         

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Sigh. Can't we have a reasonable conversation about this without immediately straw manning it because of a conservative moral panic that happened 20 years ago?

      Video game addiction is a thing, because games are designed to be addictive. Of course they are, that's the best way to make money out of them. Subscription model to an addictive game. Free mobile games in particular are carefully designed to extract money from the player by targeting the same parts of their brains that other addictive things like gam

      • Humans can be addicted to ANYTHING. Alcohol is addicting. It's still legal.
        Cigarettes are addicting, still legal.
        Sports are addicting, still legal.
        etc etc etc
        Attacking video games just because some people are addicted is pointless, but in today's 24/7/365 connected and broadcasting world, the talking heads have to have something to shout about to try and keep themselves relevant...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          Who said anything about banning video games? This is identifying a particular form of addiction in order to develop treatments tailored to it.

          Like you wouldn't treat gambling addiction the same way you would treat alcohol addiction because they have different triggers, different consequences and different solutions.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hey! ( 33014 )

      Straw man argument. Nobody thinks *everybody* who plays computer games turns antisocial.

      By the way, 2019-41 equals 1978. So either you had a Magnavox Odyssey, or you're counting Pong and Colossal Cave Adventure.

    • I think this is more nuanced than either side is giving it credit for.

      There are games that are addictive incidentally just because they're so fun. I think WoW's a good example of this and it frequently used to be used as an example of an addictive game. I have no problem with games like WoW and if people get addicted to it, it's just because it is (or was at some point) so good that people would spend all their time on it, even to the detriment of other parts of their lives. There is a problem here, but
      • I'm sorry about how long that is, I didn't realize until after the fact just how much I had to say on that.

        The tl;dr is there are games out there designed to be addictive and goad people into making bad financial decisions. I think that's a bad thing and should be shunned. There are also games that are just designed to be fun and are really good at it and I don't think those should be shunned. It's hard to make this distinction with people unfamiliar with the situation, though.

        • Yep. Some games are designed to take advantage of some people's weaknesses and drain them of cash. This is a bad thing.
          But other games are designed to be engaging and fun. I'm currently enjoying Astroneer. A fine game which fits into that category.

  • It would be fair to say that history has taught us that there are not enough objective truths to be had on the basis trying to specify gaming in excess as a viable disorder unless said intentions are to tap into a demographic for financial gains.

    Realistically an action of any varying degree could be deemed as a disorder if deemed to be a large enough scale of an issue with people in behavioral abnormalities to address concern and be labeled a valid addiction.

    Common sense (as it will vary) should be taken in

  • I'm getting close to age 50 at this point, and I still find myself playing Overwatch and Starcraft II almost nightly.

    Always had an interest in video games since owning the Radio Shack "5 in 1" game system for my black and white TV that played variants of pong.

    The thing I do see with today's gaming that's a little different than what I grew up with, though, is the social factor. Practically everything encourages voice chat as well as typed chat while playing. On the surface, you'd think this would be a GOOD

  • A wordy and somewhat obscure way of saying people try to self-medicate their mental health problems away with gaming just as people attempt to self-medicate away their physical health problems with over the counter drugs or opiods or alcohol. The UN has cause and effect reversed.

  • Does gaming a lot creating dysfunctional kids or are dysfunctional kids more likely to to game a lot?
    If it's the latter I'd rather have them gaming than be out causing problems in the neighborhood.

    Knowing 3 generations of gamers (myself included) I've seen no dysfunction. And at "55% showed at least one of the nine indicators for Internet Gaming Disorder" I'd expect I'd have seen something. Unless one of the indicators is "Played a game on the internet".

    This sounds more like people looking for something to

  • They're coming at this with the splashy soundbyte/social media/web2.0 BS that's going to get the problem ignored.

    There's a problem, and it's not simple (otherwise, it wouldn't be as widespread because regular people could identify the problem and help, or give it up themselves). The biggest problem is 'gaming' is like saying teaching. Yeah, it's thing, but it can mean 700 unrelated other things.

    First, there's society and to what level they choose is "too much". Let's take "playing soccer" for exampl

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