8.5 percent of U.S. youth addicted to video games, study finds

Douglas Gentile, a research psychologist from Iowa State University (and director of research for the National Institute of Media and the Family), recently conducted a study that found 8.5 percent of Americans between the ages of 8 and 18 (that's roughly 3 million people) are addicted to video games. During his research, Gentile polled 1,178 youths to see whether they possessed symptoms of pathological gaming -- symptoms which include spending increasing time behind a controller, irritability when playtime is reduced, "escaping problems through play," skipping homework in favor of gaming, and stealing money with which to purchase additional games.

Using these criteria, we've been addicted to the following at some point in our lives: Pokémon cards, Pogs, Skittles, Spelling Bees, laser tag, gardening, dating, Lego bricks, Frisbee golf and blogging. Yet somehow, despite our multitude of unshakable, soul-crushing dependencies, we turned out just fine.

You can check out the Entertainment Software Association's response to the study after the jump.

[Via Edge]

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Here's what ESA senior vice president of communications Rich Taylor had to say about Gentile's study:

"This is a report more in search of media headlines than scientific truth and facts. In an interview, though not in the report itself, Dr. Gentile said, 'It's not that games are bad. It's not that games are addictive.' Medical experts, including the American Medical Association, have already rejected the fallacy of video game 'addiction,' and we completely agree."

"Like all forms of entertainment, computer and video games should be a part of a well-rounded lifestyle that includes healthy eating and exercise. It is up to parents to determine when and how often their children should play any game. For our part, the industry already provides a wide range of tools and information, including timers and parental controls, to help caregivers ensure that entertainment software is used appropriately."

Reader Comments (64)

i get what you saying but at the same time i think you missed the point, i wish more were addicted. sounds bad but i have logic

First off more sales, therefore better for the games industry

secondly if a lot more kids where i lived were addicted to games i would feel a little better on the way back from the union after a "few" quiet drinks. To be honest in scotland we need more kids stuck inside instead of on the streets drinking buckfast and starting fights with anything that moves.

And before anyone points out; I have my doubts as to whether "it goes against a healthy lifestyle". it cant get any worse here.

ok, i see what you are saying. I don't think more addicted would be a good thing. Perhaps more playing games instead of other worse activities would be fine. But the central point of classifying someone as addicted is that it interferes life.

@pseth

First of all, thanks for the intelligent, anti-knee-jerk perspective on this issue. It is both courageous and refreshing.

The only caveat I have is that "interferes with life" can itself involve presupposing a few things. It seems to me that an activity has to already be seen by the culture in a negative light before someone starts talking about how it interferes with life.

For instance is any well-adjusted parent going to talk about how spending time with there child interferes with life? Not seriously. Instead, that's the life that other things are interferring with. So, we get...

Good things-->life
Bad things-->interfere with life

It seems to me that, to a large degree, reading books always seems to fall in the good things category and playing games in the bad things category. I worry that this is a hidden precursor to all the talk and studies about addiction. I worry that we see studies about how adictive playing games can be instead of how adictive reading books can be because of assumptions we've already made. And I worry that the cultural distinctions we've formed about which activities are good and which are bad might be a tad arbitrary.

In other words, when these people self-report addiciton, might they be doing so because they've already bought into the cultural notion that playing games is bad?

@Phinehas:

The thing is, the participants in the study weren't self-reporting that they were addicted to videogames. While I can't access the study itself, I looked on Google and found that the study used the same criteria that is used to determine if someone is a pathological gambler (pathological gambling is classified in the DSM-IV-TR as an Impulse-Control Disorder Not Elsewhere Classified.) The study that Gentile performed was based off of a 2007 Harris Poll - and as I mentioned he used the same criteria that determines if an adult is considered to be a pathological gambler, except in this case instead of being 'addicted' to gambling, the children were addicted to videogames. In order to be classified as pathological gamers, each child had to exhibit 6 out of 11 symptoms: Preoccupation, Tolerance, Loss of Control, Withdrawal, Escape, Chasing, Lying, Illegal Activity, Risked Relationships and/or Bailout. (see http://psychcentral.com/disorders/sx62.htm for what these mean.)

Since I cannot access the study, I cannot give my two cents as to whether or not it is a 'good study' - however, as pseth as said, the study is going to be / already is published in a very well-respected psychological journal, which, for the moment, speaks for itself.

this is to phineas

What is meant by "interferes with life" is that it causes debilitation to other aspects of life. Although not always possible, psychologists try to avoid making value judgments about how people should live their life.

So it is not just that people see video games as a waste of time and that's why it is interfering with a normal life. For example, if the video game interferes with the ability to perform school-work, if it interferes with a job, or if it causes the person to lose social relationships to the point of duress, it is considered pathological.

If, however, the person has less relationships than others or chooses to have a less demanding job so that they can game, but that seems happy and otherwise high functioning, it is not consider pathological.

The key is whether or not it is causing distress to the individual.

In the case of the current study, those who were addicted did show other decrements. There was comorbidity with ADHD (which could go both ways) and also poorer performance in school. All of this requires further research, but again, it is in line with the idea that gaming addiction is, at the very least, a marker of other more serious problems.

Great news for Joystiq!!

Thank God they didn't survey 30 years olds. I'm pretty sure I have all of those symptoms.

Did somebody say cheevos?

Ha! Great picture. It's like what if Superman and the Hamburgler had a love child.

8.5% and one superman. Go kid, go!

Oh Pogs. I miss them, I still have my slammer sitting on my desk.

Many children don't want to stop playing games of any nature. However, if parents understood a bit about "save points" I think they could typically avoid tantrums associated with video games.

Just let the kids play and do whatever and let them deal with the consequences. That's what we do with other people and most of them do fine. All these stereotypes about kids are just stupid.

not that video games are exactly MATHEMATIICS, but, in relation to a standard video or movie, video games are a form of problem solving.

tomo
san francisco, ca

8.5 percent of U.S. youth addicted to video games, study finds

Reader Comments (64)

Posted: Apr 20th 2009 4:51PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Apr 20th 2009 4:53PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Apr 20th 2009 7:11PM Phinehas said

Posted: Apr 20th 2009 9:31PM Psychfox said

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