I personally believe video game addiction can exist, based on the fact that I myself know several addicts that cannot pull themselves away from the television or the computer but at the same time I feel that if they were not addicted to video games they would be addicted to something else. Looking at the article entitled “Does Video Game Addiction Exist” by Mark Griffiths and Mark N. O. Davies they give detailed examples and conditions that video game addicts experience.
Looking at the young age of gamers today, a younger gamer can become “socially isolated” and become unable to “develop social skills” with other children of their age, (364) if they are allowed to play too many video games. Many gamers, regardless of experience level have been known to have “epileptic seizures” (364) many times because of an underlying condition to photosensitivity but it can sometimes be sudden with excessive play. These are some mental conditions that arise from video game addiction but there are also many physical conditions that also arise. According to Griffiths and Davies repeated and addicted players can develop “blisters, calluses, sore tendons, and numbness or fingers, hands, and elbows directly as a result of their game play”(364). In addition, reports and studies have been done that show that some players experience “negative effect on both heart rate and blood pressure” (364).
Looking at my two of my friends that I consider gaming addicts I can sometimes clearly see some of the symptoms of addiction. On page 362, Griffiths and Davies list the main addiction components, “salience, tolerance, euphoria, chasing, relapse, withdrawal, and two different types of conflict.” Looking at two of my friends I can easily classify them as gaming addicts. One in fact was kicked out of school for playing too much World of Warcraft and the other had to withdrawal from all of their classes for failure to attend any classes. The first one had all of the symptoms he was a vegetable that sat in front of his computer 20 hours a day while the other only shows four or five of the components he has also made attempted efforts to stop playing as much unlike my first friend.
In conclusion though I do believe video game players can become addicted but I also believe that it should be simple to quit which makes it not as addictive. My World Of Warcraft friend could not help himself and lived in a fantasy world whereas my second friend cannot be found without a controller in his hands if he is in his dorm room but he is still able to complete classes and make time for social activities. I myself have some of the components of a video game addict but I, like my second friend do not let it consume my life. So in a sense video game addiction does exist but I also think if these people didn’t play video games they would be addicted to something else may is be drugs or alcohol. These people may just have an addictive personality that is always in search of something to cling onto and use for a “buzz” or “high” (362).
3 comments:
I also like how we talked about the same topic and used the same article. I do not think there is enough evidence that shows video addiction. There isnt enough biological evidence, only psychological. I dont no any gamers that have had seizers becuase they couldnt wait a couple of hours to get home from class to play some video games, ludacris. However, I have seen people get cramps in there fingers because they have gamed for a long time, but I still dont think that that correlates with addiction. However I would have to agree that if a person is missing classes and flunks out of school all because a video game that they not only are addicts but also have quite a bit of problems.
I think you made a great point about how some people just have addictive personalities. I agree that there are many people out there that seek for a leisure activity that evolves into an obsession. And actually, I think every person in this world suffers from some sort of obsession or addiction just on different scales.
Great work.
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