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One in Nine MMOG Players Addicted?
Gamespot is running a piece looking at a UK study which may indicate serious addiction problems among a large number of Massively Multiplayer gamers. The study, conducted at Nottingham Trent, showed that almost 12% of a 7,000 person study group showed symptoms of serious addiction, as laid down by the World Health Organization. From the article: "The survey was filled in by a self-selected sample comprising mainly of males with an average age of 21, and was concerned principally with the potential for addiction to online gaming. [Director of the International Gaming Research Unit Mark] Griffiths said, 'I'm sure if we'd done this survey looking at non-online players, looking at gamers that play on stand-alone systems, my guess is that the prevalence of addiction-like symptoms would have been much less prevalent.' According to Griffiths, the problem with online games is there will never be a point where the player has battled the final boss, tied up the story, and can turn the computer off with a feeling of satisfaction."
Gamespot seems dead to me, so instead:
yes, ofcourse we show "symptoms" of addiction, my question is what does the WHO say about the number of these symptoms that we need to show before we are clasified as addicted, and howmany people showed those signs.
Meh, can't say more with out TFA beign up
Do Or Do Not, There Is No Spoon, There Is Only Zuul. Everything in the above post is probably opinion.
One addiction is as bad as another. The suggestion that people who play bingo are less "addicted" than people who play "wow" is simply wrong.
Many people just seem to have a natural propensity towards addiction. For many, this is easily controlled by substituting one stimulus for another. For some however, the desire to continue with a specific behaviour is overwhelming, and not easily supplanted.
This can be said of smoking / drinking / golfing / driving / mmorpg'ing / etc.
Identifying an addiction in someone around them is simple enough. Identifying an addiction in yourself is much more complex, as we all believe that we are in full control of our impulses.
I know for some people it's not the fact that there is "no end" but rather they enjoy the online friendships they create and log in just to talk to their online friends. I know I've logged in just to ask a friend how their surgery went, if they had their baby yet, how their day at work was, etc and not even step foot out of the main city area.
Some people just use MMO's as a glorified chat client too with leveling as a side part of it.
Sure, you played the hell out of it. I myself played the hell out of WoW, and may again at some point in the future, but my life got in the way.
If you stop, cold turkey, you're not addicted. I love games, I love MMO's...I've played a dozen. I stay up all hours, I play hardcore.
I went through a period between contracting jobs after WoW came out where I played 60+ hours a week, and that lasted all the way up to the day I started the next job, then dropped to maybe 8 hours a week. I kinda wished I could play more, but I had other things I had to do.
So what would this study say about me? That I was super addicted one day, and not the next? Addiction doesn't WORK that way. It's just stupid. These studies vary so wildly in their results, I can't help but think that they're completely full of it.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Yes I've played Oblivion. Maybe it could become addictive if it were an online game with no clear end. But I seriously doubt Oblivion will ever incite players to spend thousands of hours (and up to 100+ hours a week for weeks on end) playing at the expense of family, work, sleep, and other essential things. That's the kind of behavior brought on by MMOs such as EQ and WoW that causes people to call them addictive. I myself just quit WoW after spending about 2000 hours in the game over the last 15 months - and that's not much compared to what a lot of people have racked up in the same time span.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
These "gaming addiction" studies are getting annoying.
Addictions that involve the taking of a substance are one thing. Quite a different thing are pseudo-addictions that are merely "addictions to enjoyment" without any artificial chemical agent.
We are ALL "addicted" (in a sense) to enjoyment or pleasure or happiness or whatever turns us on --- we are always trying to maximize these things, at the expense of those that we do not enjoy. "Addiction" to our pleasures is the normal human condition.
The alleged "gaming addict" is just a gaming enthusiast who takes his or her gaming enjoyment to an extreme, but that doesn't make it a medical condition unless you are eager to find medical conditions in everything.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
I don't consider "wanting" to do something other than work to be a sign of addiction...Now if I blew off work in order to play/drink/smoke, then hell yes, addiction.
Addictions aren't manageable, by definition. They take over all aspects of your life. Just because you blow off a social function so you can play a game, that means nothing. It's when you blow off something that actually matters, whose blowing off has stark consequences, that you need to think about addiction.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
A big cause of cigarette addiction is psychological. People can get through two weeks (after which, most of the physical dependency is gone) and still pick it up again because of the pyschological factors.
Just because it's not physical addiction doesn't mean it's not an addiction; they are just weak-willed.
Right, so let's start by worrying about those things that are proven to be both dangerous psychological addictive. Like, say, religion. Then we'll worry about minor details like games.
I was in much the same position after I graduated college but before getting a job. Yes, I exhibited enough symptoms that I could have been diagnosed as being addicted to a MMO. I had full control over my ability to play or not; but interestingly enough, unless you make the decision to stop, that ability is irrelevant when it comes to diagnosing addiction.
Up until I cut back my play time (I got a job), I was, technically, addicted. After getting a job, the presence of another time-consuming activity in my life, one that received priority over my MMO habits, indicated the absence of a MMO addiction. Without something "better" to do, addiction is pretty much a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Without something better to do, there will almost assuredly be withdrawl; I want to play, thats why I play. I enjoy it. If you suddenly tell me I can't play, then yeah, I still want to and that means withdrawl symptoms. If I decide not to play because of X, withdrawl is not a problem because I chose to stop playing for a reason, I might want to play, but I am capable of facing the reality that I can't do it, because of X. Failure to face this reality and neglecting those "better things" IS a sign of addiction, but in the absence of "better things" you still fit the mold of addiction.
So, yes, using people that have done as I did and play excessively during times of unemployment / inactivity / absence of "better things" as a case study, there are a ot of people out there that, while they are "addicted" today, might not be tomorrow. I'd argue that they were not in fact addicted at any time, but the clinical definition of addiction assumes that in all cases there is something better to do, so addiction is that fickle of a mistress.
Regarding this particular study, I call them out on their claims of withdrawl symptoms. I don't see how they could have found 7000 people that would be in a position to suffer withdrawl given the requirement that you need to interject a priority into their life and observe the results, as opposed to making them stop or observing them after they have been forced to stop. I beleive they have used general surveys/observation that fail to capture this aspect adequately, since unless they made the decision to stop, they aren't a valid subject. Addiction is characterized as being uncontrollable, so the choice to stop has to be present and accepted, but addiction will foil the choice. Wanting to play once this priority has been added could be construed as a craving, but not withdrawl, not unless the desire overcomes the new priority. We are, after all, talking about a form of entertainment, and there is a natural tendency to want to have fun that is unrelated to addiction. Craving entertainment/fun when you're forced to do something that isn't fun (work--for some people) is natural and not at all indicative of addiction. Having a preference for the form this fun takes is likewise not a sign of addiction.
Even deprived of withdrawl, they still list 3 of the criteria of addiction (addiction requires 3 criteria, so debunking another--disclaimer on this later--means their addiction numbers are wrong). Granted, there were probably other signs of addiction, but htey were not mentioned and I accept that there will be some genuine cases of addiction, but a large number are probably misdiagnosed.
So lets attack the claims of neglecting other activities. I effectively stopped painting when I started college. This had nothing to do with addiction. Once I was employed in a programming position I effectively stopped programming as a hobby. The first case was because I had other things to do with my time that were more entertaining. The second case is because I was programming at work and wanted to take a break from it in my leisure time. Neglect of other activities carries with it the requisite that you should be maintaining those activities. Just because you start to pursue one activity and that causes you to stop pursuing another does not indicate neglect, although it
I was wowed by its beautiful graphics, and visually-sensory based immersive world.. but I quickly found that i cared nothing for the characters around me and my own character, unlike the baldurs gate series which i am revisiting. Just read the dialogues in the first game - we hardly ever get that level of writing in games. Mostly, crpgs are dumbed down for the broad market and the mtv attention-span.
My addition also lies in interesting narration. A discourse i feel part of - with characters i can relate to. When its all about the "dings", you dont really care about stuff except modifiers and stats (which granted is a big part of the sense of "false" accomplishment).
Game devs.. please satisfy my basic-human need for good story-telling; but storytelling that i can interact with; where my choices affect the outcome so your story becomes my story. This is what i miss in most games
- Mad, ingenous - they've both left you puzzled -
I think that most of the allure to MMOs is that you are playing with other real people, of course if you compare MMO results to an offline game there is going to be a staggering difference.
Why do people get "addicted" to MMOs? I think it is because of the interaction with other people. Someone joins a guild, they play with other people frequently, they become friends with people in their guild. Now they aren't just playing a video game, they are playing a video game WITH FRIENDS.
I play MMOs quite a bit and played World of Warcraft for over a year. When my RL friends stopped playing the game became boring to me because I was no longer playing with friends. I might have a looser type of addiction to MMOs as I can't wait for the next one to come out so that I can play it with my friends. I also tend to quit MMOs maybe a month or 2 after my friends stop playing because I do befriend some of my guildmates. I find myself logging onto the game and checking my friends list; if no one is on then I quit the game, if someone is on then I talk to them and play.
Other people, the people you would consider hardcore addicts, might not have many RL friends so the people in their guilds become good friends, maybe even best friends and talking nearly every day. These people will continue to play as long as their internet friends are playing and if their internet friends are in the same low-friend-count situation then they will keep playing which leads to a group of people whose playing habits become dependent of each other. Since one person will only quit if the other quits, and visa versa, no one ever quits. Perhaps when an unforeseen event occurs, such as a person losing internet access or their computer breaking, then one person is forced to stop playing and the dependent counterpart person decides to stop playing because his friend is no longer playing.
I don't buy into this B.S. about the game making addicts because you can "never beat the last boss" and never truly win the game. These people are addicted, yes, but not to the game. They are addicted to something that the game can give them: a friend, fame, or anonymity.
If the game is all you can think about, and you find yourself irritated that you're unable to play because you're "tied down" by things like social functions, work, sleeping, etc you're probably addicted.
No, that's a sign of obsession. Obsession can be bad, it can even be a part of addiction, but it isn't addiction. Obsession can also be something that you're just a lot more intersted in than whatever else you are doing. Did I think about WoW almost constantly when I was playing it the most? Yes. But so what? I would think about wrestling almost all the time when I was doing that because I liked wrestling more than I like Senior AP English or my job at Little Caesars. I was obsessed, sure, but at the end of the day it wasn't anything harmful (uh, except the whole starving myself part, different story), and when the season ended I was sad (withdrawal?), but oh well, that was it. That's not addiction.
Addiction is when you want to stop the behavior, but can't.
Addiction is when the behavior is harming yourself and your loved ones, but you can't stop yourself from doing it and continuing the harm.
Your typical adult nicotine addict (like my mother) knows it's bad for them, doesn't actually like cigarettes and wishes they could stop, but when they try they find themselves unable to.
An alcoholic, who frequently is in denial about their problem, may black out and fall down the stairs breaking a leg, go to jail for drunk driving, lose their job, their wife, their friends, even their home and still continue drinking.
It is certainly possible to be addicted to a video game, and believe me I can feel the pull when the hit-the-lever-fifty-times-get-a-peanut mechanics of all MMOs kicks in. There are people who have lost spouses and jobs to WoW. There are people who don't even find the game fun anymore but still play, even to the point of losing their jobs. Those people are addicted. Your average loser who plays 40 hours a week, who only talks about WoW with their friends, but still holds down their job and maintains whatever passes for their social life while still getting a kick out of Pwning N00bz0rs, they're just obsessed.
The enemies of Democracy are
But in our cult, you get to kill dragons, not wait for a judgement day that just never seems to come (next year maybe!). Yes, you lose touch with family like a real cult-- guildies will even scorn you for leaving for family time ("WTF, you're logging? Come on, we've been planning this raid all week. We need your DPS, dude.").
In our cult, we don't go door to door spouting crazy nonsense that would get our asses kicked if people didn't feel so bad for us. We stay indoors, like good crazy people should.
And like a real cult, the other members may feel real sadness and loss when you have to "disconnect". "What do you mean FlowerGirl quit cause of RL issues? But she... but she... she was our recruitment officer, and she laughed at my jokes :("
My script don't crash! She crashes, you crashed her!