“Video Game 'Addiction' Tied to Depression, Anxiety in Kids” plus 2 more |
- Video Game 'Addiction' Tied to Depression, Anxiety in Kids
- Do video games fuel mental health problems?
- Come Play Nature Games for Kids at PPL’s Lake Wallenpaupack
| Video Game 'Addiction' Tied to Depression, Anxiety in Kids Posted: 17 Jan 2011 06:02 AM PST MONDAY, Jan. 17 (HealthDay News) -- Video game addiction among children and teens may lead to the development of psychological disorders such as depression, researchers say. The new study found that children who are more likely to become addicted to video games (which the researchers call "pathological" video gaming) are those who spend a lot of hours playing these games, have trouble fitting in with other kids and are more impulsive than children who aren't addicted. Once addicted to video games, children were more likely to become depressed, anxious or have other social phobias. Not surprisingly, children who were hooked on video games also saw their school performance suffer. "What we've known from other studies is that video gaming addiction looks similar to other addictions. But what wasn't clear was what comes before what. Gaming might be a secondary problem. It might be that kids who are socially awkward, who aren't doing well in school, get depressed and then lose themselves into games. We haven't really known if gaming is important by itself, or what puts kids at risk for becoming addicted," said Douglas A. Gentile, an associate professor of psychology at Iowa State University in Ames. Not only did the study reveal risk factors for pathological gaming, "the real surprise came from looking at the outcomes, because we had assumed depression might be the real problem," explained Gentile. "But we found that in kids who started gaming pathologically, depression and anxiety got worse. And, when they stopped gaming, the depression lifted. It may be that these disorders [co-exist], but games seem to make the problem worse." Results of the study were released online and will be published in the February issue of Pediatrics. The study included 3,034 children and teens from Singapore; 743 were in 3rd grade, 711 in 4th grade, 916 in 7th grade and 664 in 8th grade. The children came from six primary schools and six secondary schools. Five of the schools participating were all-boys' schools. Almost 2,200 of the study participants were male. The children -- although not their parents or teachers -- were surveyed annually from 2007 through 2009. Eighty-three percent of the study volunteers reported playing video games sometimes, and another 10 percent said they had played video games in the past. The average time spent playing video games was around 20.5 to 22.5 hours a week. But, Gentile pointed out, "A lot of video gaming isn't the same as an addiction. Some kids can play a lot without having an effect on their lives. It's when you see other areas of your child's life suffer that it may be addiction. Parents might notice that a child doesn't have the same friends any more, or that he's just sitting in his room playing video games all the time. Or, there might be a drop in school performance," he said. In this study about 9 percent of the children surveyed qualified as being pathological video gamers, and Gentile said that number is fairly consistent with the U.S. population's rate of pathological gaming. Playing video games more than 30 hours a week, lack of social competence, less-than-average empathy and greater impulsivity all contributed to the addiction, the researchers found. Gentile said the researchers aren't sure how gaming is contributing to depression, anxiety and other social phobias, but in this study, "the gaming precedes the depression. We don't know if it's truly causal, but gaming has an effect on its own, and you can't just ignore gaming and treat depression," he said. Although pathological video gaming appears to share a number of characteristics with other addictive behaviors, such as pathological gambling, the researchers noted that "pathological gaming" is not yet an established psychological disorder. "Getting highly involved with video games can become addicting, and parents need to be cautious about how many hours kids play," said Dr. Richard Gallagher, director of the Parenting Institute at the New York University Child Study Center in New York City. "In this study, it looks like kids with less than 19 hours a week didn't get involved in pathological gaming, so no more than two hours a day," he suggested. But Gallagher also emphasized that time spent playing is less important than the effect that gaming is having on your child. "If they're attracted to games so much so that they don't get involved in other things, or they talk about gaming and don't talk about anything else, there may be a problem," he said. Both Gallagher and Gentile said the finding that video games can lead to poorer school performance is likely due to the time spent gaming. "Gaming is taking away time that could be spent on activities that have educational benefit," Gentile said. Gentile also recommends no more than two hours a day of "screen time," in line with the American Academy of Pediatrics' guidelines. And, screen time includes TV, computer, video games and even the newest music players and smart phones that have computer-like capabilities. More information For more advice on children and healthy TV, Internet and video game time, visit the Nemours Foundation. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Do video games fuel mental health problems? Posted: 17 Jan 2011 04:16 AM PST NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – There might be trouble brewing behind the glassy eyes of kids who spend too much time and energy on video games, according to a controversial new study. In the 2-year study of more than 3,000 school children in Singapore, researchers found nearly one in ten were video game "addicts," and most were stuck with the problem. While these kids were more likely to have behavioral problems to begin with, excessive gaming appeared to cause additional mental woes. "When children became addicted, their depression, anxiety, and social phobias got worse, and their grades dropped," said Douglas A. Gentile, who runs the Media Research Lab at Iowa State University in Ames and worked on the study. "When they stopped being addicted, their depression, anxiety, and social phobias got better." He said neither parents nor healthcare providers are paying enough attention to video games' effect on mental health. "We tend to approach it as 'just' entertainment, or just a game, and forget that entertainment still affects us," he told Reuters Health in an e-mail. "In fact, if it doesn't affect us, we call it 'boring!'" But an independent expert said the study had important flaws. "My own research has shown that excessive video game play is not necessarily addictive play and that many video gamers can play for long periods without there being any negative detrimental effects," said Mark Griffiths, director of the International Gaming Research Unit at Nottingham Trent University in the UK. "If nine percent of children were genuinely addicted to video games there would be video game addiction clinics in every major city!" he said in an e-mail, adding that the concept is not currently an accepted diagnosis among psychiatrists and psychologists. Part of the problem, Griffiths argued, is that the new work may be measuring preoccupation instead of addiction. In the study, teachers handed out questionnaires to students in the third, fourth, seventh and eighth grades, including questions about their gaming habits, social skills, school performance and depression. The kids also answered ten questions to find out if they were addicted to gaming -- so-called "pathological" gamers. If they answered half in the positive, they got the label. The questions included things like having neglected household chores to spend more time on video games, doing poorly on a school assignment or test as a result, or playing video games to escape from problems or bad feelings. On average, the kids said they played about 20 hours a week. Between 9 and 12 percent of boys qualified as addicted in this study, compared to 3 to 5 percent of girls. Of those children who started out as addicts, more than eight in 10 remained so during the study. "It's not simply a short-term problem for most children," Gentile said. While the researchers didn't put a number on how many youngsters had mental problems, they did find that those who played longer hours, were more impulsive or had poorer social skills were at higher risk of getting "addicted" over the 2-year period. Those who did become addicted reported increasing symptoms of depression, anxiety and social phobia. Gentile said it appeared that unhealthy gaming habits were fueling the kids' mental problems, which then in turn might cause them to up their screen time and so forth. But he acknowledged his research didn't prove that point. In an earlier U.S. study, he found that children who watched a lot of TV or played a lot of video games had slightly more problems concentrating on school work. However, that study couldn't prove that screen time was at the root of the narrowing attention span, either. The American Academy of Pediatrics, which published the new study in its journal Pediatrics, recommends limiting children's time in front of computers or TVs to 2 hours daily. "One thing we have to bear in mind is that children playing video games for 2 to 3 hours a day is normal. It's displaced activities like watching TV," Griffiths said. Still, he said a small minority of kids probably do suffer from true video game addiction, just as some people are pathological gamblers. In general, Griffith advises that parents try to give their kids educational games instead of violent ones, encourage playing in groups, and follow the directions from the manufacturers, such as sitting at least two feet from the screen and not playing when feeling tired. "I have three kids, all of who are the archetypal 'screenagers' who spend a lot of time a day interacting with technology" said Griffiths. "Basically, even when playing a couple of hours most days it is not impinging negatively on their lives." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Come Play Nature Games for Kids at PPL’s Lake Wallenpaupack Posted: 17 Jan 2011 07:19 AM PST Honesdale, Pa. —
This program will begin inside and include a short venture outside, so wear sturdy shoes and warm gear. This interactive free program is appropriate for families with children ages 6 and older, but this program isn't just for the kids. Adults will learn some useful information, too, like how to save a few bucks on your electric bill. The program is free and open to the public. For more information, please contact PPL at 570-253-7076 or pplpreserves@pplweb.com. For directions to this event, please visit www.pplpreserves.com, click on "Lake Wallenpaupack," then select "Directions." The Wallenpaupack Environmental Learning Center is part of PPL's Wallenpaupack hydroelectric project, built in 1926 near Hawley, Pa. The learning center is off Route 6 just east of the intersection of Routes 590 and 6 and next to Wallenpaupack Area High School. The hydroelectric plant provides clean, renewable energy in times of high electricity demand. The learning center offers programs and workshops to teachers, students and the public on the environment, conservation and the lake. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| You are subscribed to email updates from kids games - Yahoo! News Search Results To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 comments:
Post a Comment