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Synikul · **Video Game Addiction: A New Diagnosis? -** 06-21-07

Quote:

Video Game Addiction: A New Diagnosis?
Is Video Game Addiction A Psychiatric Disorder? AMA Report Seeks To Declare It One
CHICAGO, Jun. 21, 2007

(AP) The telltale signs are ominous: teens holing up in their rooms, ignoring friends, family, even food and a shower, while grades plummet and belligerence soars. The culprit isn't alcohol or drugs. It's video games, which for certain kids can be as powerfully addictive as heroin, some doctors contend.

A leading council of the nation's largest doctors' group wants to have this behavior officially classified as a psychiatric disorder, to raise awareness and enable sufferers to get insurance coverage for treatment.

In a report prepared for the American Medical Association's annual policy meeting starting Saturday in Chicago, the council asks the group to lobby for the disorder to be included in a widely used mental illness manual created and published by the American Psychiatric Association.

AMA delegates could vote on the proposal as early as Monday.

It likely won't happen without heated debate. Video game makers scoff at the notion that their products can cause a psychiatric disorder. Even some mental health experts say labeling the habit a formal addiction is going too far.

Dr. James Scully, the psychiatric association's medical director, said the group will seriously consider the AMA report in the long process of revising the diagnostic manual. The current manual was published in 1994; the next edition is to be completed in 2012.

Up to 90 percent of American youngsters play video games and as many as 15 percent of them _ more than 5 million kids _ may be addicted, according to data cited in the AMA council's report.

Joyce Protopapas of Frisco, Texas, said her 17-year-old son, Michael, was a video addict. Over nearly two years, video and Internet games transformed him from an outgoing, academically gifted teen into a reclusive manipulator who flunked two 10th grade classes and spent several hours day and night playing a popular online video game called World of Warcraft.

"My father was an alcoholic ... and I saw exactly the same thing" in Michael, Protopapas said. "We battled him until October of last year," she said. "We went to therapists, we tried taking the game away.

"He would threaten us physically. He would curse and call us every name imaginable," she said. "It was as if he was possessed."

When she suggested to therapists that Michael had a video game addiction, "nobody was familiar with it," she said. "They all pooh-poohed it."

Last fall, the family found a therapist who "told us he was addicted, period." They sent Michael to a therapeutic boarding school, where he has spent the past six months _ at a cost of $5,000 monthly that insurance won't cover, his mother said.

A support group called On-Line Gamers Anonymous has numerous postings on its Web site from gamers seeking help. Liz Woolley, of Harrisburg, Pa., created the site after her 21-year-old son fatally shot himself in 2001 while playing an online game she says destroyed his life.

In a February posting, a 13-year-old identified only as Ian told of playing video games for nearly 12 hours straight, said he felt suicidal and wondered if he was addicted.

"I think i need help," the boy said.

Postings also come from adults, mostly men, who say video game addiction cost them jobs, family lives and self-esteem.

According to the report prepared by the AMA's Council on Science and Public Health, based on a review of scientific literature, "dependence-like behaviors are more likely in children who start playing video games at younger ages."

Overuse most often occurs with online role-playing games involving multiple players, the report says. Blizzard Entertainment's teen-rated, monster-killing World of Warcraft is among the most popular. A company spokesman declined to comment on whether the games can cause addiction.

Dr. Martin Wasserman, a pediatrician who heads the Maryland State Medical Society, said the AMA proposal will help raise awareness and alled it "the right thing to do."

But Michael Gallagher, president of the Entertainment Software Association, said the trade group sides with psychiatrists "who agree that this so-called 'video-game addiction' is not a mental disorder."

"The American Medical Association is making premature conclusions without the benefit of complete and thorough data," Gallagher said.

Dr. Karen Pierce, a psychiatrist at Chicago's Children's Memorial Hospital, said she sees at least two children a week who play video games excessively.

"I saw somebody this week who hasn't been to bed, hasn't showered ... because of video games," she said. "He is really a mess."

She said she treats it like any addiction and creating a separate diagnosis is unnecessary.

Dr. Michael Brody, head of a TV and media committee at the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, agreed. He praised the AMA council for bringing attention to the problem, but said excessive video-game playing could be a symptom for other things, such as depression or social anxieties that already have their own diagnoses.

"You could make lots of behavioral things into addictions. Why stop at video gaming?" Brody asked. Why not Blackberries, cell phones, or other irritating habits, he said.

Video Game Addiction: A New Diagnosis?, Is Video Game Addiction A Psychiatric Disorder? AMA Report Seeks To Declare It One - CBS News

Is it a mental disease, or a symptom of another mental disease? Or is it just another case of "experts" blowing smoke up our asses again to get more money flowing?

Uncletiggs · 06-21-07

It is an addiction. Like alcohol, drugs, etc. And you can get insurance to cover those. Why not this.

waffles · 06-21-07

What a load of shit. We don't need everything under the sun to be a medical condition. They might be addicted to video games, but does that warrant a condition unto itself?

I mean, fuck, I can't stop breathing. I'll probably die without it. Even if I don't, I know I'll be fucked up mentally.

Uncletiggs · 06-21-07

Son, this country IS a set of medical conditions.. I've known peeps that bail on responsibilities to play online.. I have felt the limits myself. I know what an addiction is. Gaming can easily become an addiction.

waffles · 06-21-07

I'm not trying to say that they aren't addicting. I've skipped more than one class so I could stay int he dorms and play Ultimate Spider-Man. I just don't think that video game addiction needs to be a condition in itself.

BlyssfulStorm · 06-21-07

since i work in a game store, am i part of the problem?

waffles · 06-21-07

Yes. I mean no. I mean....

Fuck, just save me a used copy God of War and I'll come get it in the morning.

Billy the Kidd · 06-21-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Synikul

Is it a mental disease, or a symptom of another mental disease? Or is it just another case of "experts" blowing smoke up our asses again to get more money flowing?

Sounds like they're running out of victims to prescribe new expensive drug treatments to.

Billy the Kidd · 06-21-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uncletiggs

It is an addiction. Like alcohol, drugs, etc. And you can get insurance to cover those. Why not this.

Because drugs and alcohol are chemicals. Video gaming is no more an addiction than is sex, masturbation, TV watching, or any other millions of things we do.

Billy the Kidd · 06-21-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uncletiggs

Son, this country IS a set of medical conditions.. I've known peeps that bail on responsibilities to play online.. I have felt the limits myself. I know what an addiction is. Gaming can easily become an addiction.

Someone would rather do something fun, than to do something they might not find fun but have to do anyway? Say it ain't so!

Uncletiggs · 06-22-07

it ain't so.

Uncletiggs · 06-22-07

Tell you what Billy.. go 3 months without playing a video game.. no WoW, no Xbox, No P3, No Wii, No DF arcade, No windows solitare, none.. Then tell me what happens.. besides your life being more interesting.. LOL

Billy the Kidd · 06-22-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uncletiggs

Tell you what Billy.. go 3 months without playing a video game.. no WoW, no Xbox, No P3, No Wii, No DF arcade, No windows solitare, none.. Then tell me what happens.. besides your life being more interesting.. LOL

Ive done that plenty of times. Ive been an avid videogame fanatic since I had my 1st Atari and Coleco Vision. I started when I was 4 or 5. I practically learned to read from playing games like Castlevania and Zelda.

Ive played for years on end and then went years on end without so much as touching a single game.

Uncletiggs · 06-22-07

So do it now.. Drop ALL the games for just 3 months.. not even playing the cell phone ones..

Billy the Kidd · 06-22-07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uncletiggs

So do it now.. Drop ALL the games for just 3 months.. not even playing the cell phone ones..

If I don't, is that supposed to prove that i'm addicted to video games? Stop having sex and masturbating for 1 year, otherwise you're addicted to it. Hows that? We can do this together.

Uncletiggs · 06-22-07

LOL been there, done that.. On both counts..

Billy the Kidd · 06-22-07

Heh, fair enough... but lets do it now.

Uncletiggs · 06-22-07

why not.. I haven't any perspectives that meet my minimum qualifications.. And my sex drive hasn't been active for awhile due to that.. But remember.. I'm an Old fart!! I have the advantage!! LOL

White Rabies · 06-22-07

Holy shit, I should inform my therapist of my video game [addiction] (6-10 hours a day playing, or thinking about playing)...

Maybe I can get prescribed a new drug to abuse