My SO and I take turns, though. He’ll be sucked into bf2 for hours at a time while I’m on WoW and whoever happens to cook dinner is the one bringing it to the other at their computer (he usually cooks, which is great). We used to play WoW together, but that was bad for our relationship. After being asked by him “Baby, can you try not to suck?” we realized that we needed to change things. We do, however, have real lives that we take care of. Bills get paid, cats get fed, we fit in enough physical activity of different sorts to keep healthy. The only thing that really gets put off due to gaming might be a little house work, but we still manage to find time to do that each week.
I think there can be a big difference between a hobby and an addiction. My SO is a hobby gamer. He plays video games, tabletop games, and live action roleplaying games. Since he diversifies this way, and actually invests some creative energy into parts of it, it really is more of a hobby than just an escape from other issues. A hobby is definitely more of a creative outlet for many people. Gaming for many, like Television or reading a book, is generally much more of an escape. Which isn’t a bad thing in and of itself, but can very easily be taken to extremes. It’s a matter of perspective as to whether they’re healthy extremes or not. Hobbies might be considered healthier because of the creative outlet. But it doesn’t matter what it is, if you’re avoiding basic responsibilities (like eating and sleeping), then something’s wrong.
A few reasons off the top of my head.[ul][li]We don’t realize or disagree that a MMO’s style of reinforcement is akin to a Skinner box.[]We recognize that but don’t care, and tell ourselves that honestly, this time we’ll quit before it gets boring and we’re paying a monthly fee for a game that feels more like work than play.[]Masochism.[/ul]Knorf, regarding people who have died from playing games for too much time in one sitting: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4137782.stm[/li][quote]
A South Korean man has died after reportedly playing an online computer game for 50 hours with few breaks.
The 28-year-old man collapsed after playing the game Starcraft at an internet cafe in the city of Taegu, according to South Korean authorities.
…
“We presume the cause of death was heart failure stemming from exhaustion,” a Taegu provincial police official told the Reuters news agency.
He was taken to hospital following his collapse, but died shortly after, according to the police. It is not known whether he suffered from any previous health conditions.
They added that he had recently been fired from his job because he kept missing work to play computer games.
[/quote]
Based on the final quoted paragraph, I would consider it a safe assumption that this man demonstrated some signs of addiction.
YIKES!!! No, our housework never slides THAT much. We’re both 30-something, work full-time, and take the trash out regularly. Most necessary stuff rarely goes more than 1 week without getting done. That picture looks like one of the extremes that’s bordering on unhealthy. If we hear a news story in the future titled “Gamer Dies when Crushed Beneath Pile of Snackfood Wrappers and Takeout Containers” I’ll know who it was. My sweetie looked at that picture and got the heebie jeebies.
My personal experience is that some games are (fun/addicting) enough that I play them far later into the night than I should. It leaves me tired the next day at work.
But if I do not play the game, I will often do something else later into the night than I should (idly surf the net, read a book, or post to this here bulletin board thing.)
So for me it is a combination of perhaps being personally vulnerable to behavior that I know will have minor consequences, and the enjoyment factor of the game. And as for the “need social interaction” comments, when playing Diablo 2 for far too many hours, I was able to use the chat to have many fun adventures with long time face to face friends of mine who lived all around the country. When games make voice chat more common it’ll be very similar to face to face gaming.
Some “psychological” addictions can have a physical component. That’s why some compulsive behaviors can be treated with medications. And although it’s true that video games don’t alter our brains in the same way that heroin does, I’m not sure that we can say that they don’t alter our brains in some ways eventually.
It almost sounds like the game is performing a certain kind of behavior modification, kill monster get points, get points, more power, kill monster faster, even more points, even more power, etc, etc. At least for me, how does this become so ingrained that we choose the game over other potential rewards like sex, hot food, money from continued employment, shelter, etc.
Well, I’ve spent a good bit of time playing video games, and in my experience, game addiction is a definite thing, quite different from merely enjoying a game and subsequently wanting to play it. I’ve experienced both. The last game I was addicted to was Diablo II (from the same developer as World of Warcraft (WoW), if anyone is curious/doesn’t know). The scary thing about that was that it really wasn’t enjoyable. I can appreciate that there are certain interesting aspects of Diablo II, but the majority of game time for me was really quite mind-numbing, and not at all fun, but I still had some strange compulsion to partake in it. It felt very different from playing a good, entertaining game that you actually enjoy.
I think there are certain aspects of gameplay that are particularly addictive, and quite often there is incentive for developers to include these things in MMOGs - this is especially true when a subscription is required to play.
Of course, there is some overlap. I was probably addicted to Advance Wars DS, but it was also thoroughly worth playing, so it didn’t trouble me so much.
Anyway, to answer the OP, I would guess that if there’s a problem it’s that ‘hardcore’ gamers don’t often acknowledge that there’s a difference between wanting to play a game because it’s fun and wanting to play a game because you’re addicted to it.
lno got you the cite, but I just wanted to add that it seems like all the cases of someone dying because of playing video games while neglecting the body have happened in South Korea. I know the last time it happened it was reported on Slashdot. This particular story might be of interest.
Next Q If a game is at is core a fancy Skinner box, is it tryly an addiction or a kind of behavior modification tool? If so do the SO’s of gamers have a point that the gamer is if not an addict, a victim of an elaborate intentional behavioral modification tool?
Yes, I would agree that games are harmful, elaborate, intentional, behavioral modification tools.
Lets’s look at a few -
[ul]Golf - encourages laziness (through carts), alcohol (through women on carts selling beer to you), and obscenities. Golf should indeed be banned.[/ul]
[ul]Professional baseball watching -encourages laziness (through youir sole participaiton being cheering), alcohol (through guys with trays selling beer to you), and obscenities. Professional baseball should indeed be banned.
Softball - encourages laziness (since most of the game you just stand around watching batters), alcohol (through 2nd base being a keg), and obscenities. Softball should indeed be banned.[/ul]
Apparently the submit button and the preview post button have different functions. Odd. Pretend I hit the other one.
[ul]Professional baseball watching -encourages laziness (through your sole participation being cheering), alcohol (through guys with trays selling beer to you), and obscenities. Professional baseball should indeed be banned.[/ul][ul]Softball - encourages laziness (since most of the game you just stand around watching batters), alcohol (through 2nd base being a keg), and obscenities. Softball should indeed be banned.[/ul]
You are correct. Sitting around watching sports all day and drinking is probably at least as bad for you as sitting around playing games all day. At least if you actually baseball you get some exercise. No one said it should be banned though.
Fact is we as a society seem like we actually DO much less and WATCH much more.
