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Average Gamer Is 35, Fat and Bummed
kamapuaa writes "According to a study published in the upcoming October issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, the average US video game player is 35 years old, overweight, and tends toward depression. Specifically, female video game players tended towards depression, while males tended towards large BMIs. While the study itself points to several conclusions, one researcher noted: '... habitual use of video games as a coping response may provide a genesis for obsessive-compulsive video-game playing, if not video-game addiction.'"
On the flip side, the Washington Post is running a story about the mental health benefits of playing video games.
Is it just me, or does anyone else think the mods intentionally replaced "Slashdotter" with "Gamer" in the title?
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Video games as coping mechanism. That's an interesting way of looking at this. I found that when I played World of Warcraft, that's exactly what it was. It allowed me to cope with not having a girlfriend and deaden my emotions to the outside world. In that sense it became very addictive. I think it would probably be very similar to drinking alcohol or some drug.
It's funny because WoW is the only game that did that to me. I'm glad I stopped playing because now I don't feel like an automaton (gradually regaining my humanity), but I really feel bad for all the people who are like me who are still playing for that reason. I think WoW is a great game if you can just play it as a game to have fun, but I'm just not one of those people.
Funnily enough I can still play console games without any problems, they are not the same at all. Perhaps it's just pseudo social aspect, or the feeling while playing WoW that you are forced to grind (e.g. it's out of your control). An interesting thing that will probably be studied by psychologists for years to come.
35, Fat, and Bummed? Or something close?
Specifically, female video game players tended towards depression, while males tended towards large BMIs.
Are the women depressed because their dating pool is made up of fat guys?
Or do we eat because our women are so depressing and food is our only solace?
We keep hearing about how the average age of a gamer is around 30. It's surprising, but I can deal with that. Not unreasonable. Now 35? That's a little tougher to swallow, and a cursory look at the article shows why.
(Emphasis mine).
The study excluded kids. It's just adult gamers.
Still it's a little tough to believe that the average age is 35 unless there were few members of the study outside their 30s, or their definition of "gamer" is quite loose. They may consider going to Atlantic City and playing video poker a "gamer", but just because someone Skis once a year or so, are they a Skier? I know we want to count casual gamers, but we still need to exclude "irregular" gamers for the purposes of studies like this, or the findings are quite meaningless.
Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
I'm 38 dammit, and who the hell told you you could use my silhouette for the picture?
That this probably applies to movies, books, and several other ways that a person can blow off steam and escape from the day to day grind for a while without getting exercise.
Shock! Awe!
I thought I had seen obsessive escapist book reading before, then my wife got a kindle. Actually, I wonder if these addictions are not worst than many drugs. Afterall, reading is healthy and good, and nobody wants to bother someone reading a book. (nor do they usually want to be bothered)
Though, once you have spent all your free time reading for a month to the exclusion of household chores and social interaction.... well I doubt its much better or worst if its a video game.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
I don't understand these studies about addictive gamers who are depressed, lonely, blah blah blah. Gaming, like watching tv dramas or sports or news, or listening to the radio or ipod, is simply a way to pass the time. Why gaming would make someone depressed makes zero sense to me.
I think these studies are kind of missing the point.
In the US at least, things are changing. A lot of people are relatively isolated in their personal lives. We're expected to work longer and longer hours, for worse and worse pay. We get less time off. There's less time for socialization. There's less access to healthy food. Lifestyles are increasingly sedentary.
Folks get home from a long day at a job they don't like, cram some unhealthy food down their throats, and then disconnect from the world - they play video games, or surf the web, or watch tv, or get drunk, or whatever.
It doesn't surprise me that folks are, in general, overweight and tending towards depression.
"Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
There's two major flaws with the study:
1. The test group was 500 people from Seattle/Tacoma, WA. That's a very small set from a very small region if you're trying to make a conclusion about all gamers. (Also, I hear Seattle is a depressing city, but that could just be hearsay).
2. They use BMI to claim if the subjects are overweight. BMI doesn't really work unless you're trying to identify obesity. It's not accurate in the 'overweight' range since it's a simple weight-to-height calculation and ignores muscle mass vs fat mass. Technically speaking, my BMI states that I'm overweight (6'1", 190lbs), but it ignores the fact I'm physically active in sports.
The traditional and popular answers for coping with depression ("get out more!") don't work for introverts. I would expect that introverts are overrepresented in the "gamer" demographic.
But I don't think it is loneliness that depresses this group. I suspect it is meaninglessness. existential crisis hits this kind of person pretty hard. Not only is life itself meaninglessness, but their life in particular is meaningless. Goals for goals' sake have no motivational power, so they lack drive to do much of anything apart from play their games. They go to work and perform your basic survival tasks out of rote habit. Such is the life of someone who can't find anything that is really exciting.
It is easy to say "well you lack drive, and that is what is wrong with you." The answer is rejected out of hand, since such people are clear-minded enough to see that the only reason they "lack drive" is because the meaningless bullshit that drives most people is precisely that...meaningless bullshit...and hence they simply can't get excited about it, even if they try.
You don't help such people by taking away their games and forcing them to go to dance clubs (or whatever). They just sit there, feeling alone in the crowd, and wishing they could be doing something more interesting than listen to air-heads blather on about shoes.
In my experience (anecdote. sue me.) study of psychology, physics, and philosophy keep life seeming interesting enough to be worth the trouble. I combine that with games, of course, because entertainment is important too. Also, I meditate (non-religious), but I realize that not everyone finds non-drug-induced altered states of consciousness to be as intriguing as I do.
I am going to say it is "ok" for people to be this way. If these methods of coping with depression don't work, then get a prescription for some mood-altering drugs. That is ok too. Just don't let people tell you that you are some kind of failure for having seen the valuelessness of the bullshit they proffer as being worthwhile.
I guess most people didn't catch the significance of Andrews University...
Two of the study's coauthours (Wendi Kannenberg, Gary L. Hopkins) are from Andrews University Institute for Prevention of Addictions. Andrews is a Christian university run by a denomination which doesn't accept evolution. I've spoken to a prof from their biology department, apparently it's a bastion of the Intelligent Design movement. (Here's a book published by Andrews University Press).
I'm not saying that proponents of intelligent design and those around them are incapable of doing serious scientific research. I'm thinking this might partially explain what feels like an anti-gamer bias.
The joys of crowdsourcing...
The opinons expressed are those of the voices in the author's head and are not necessarily those of the author.