[Air-l] Video Game Addiction

[Rhiannon Bury]

I think we should be suspicious of terms like "video addiction";
addictions are primarily physiological, not psychological and there is not
a shred of evidence that playing video games alters brain chemistry in any
way. I would say that this story is part of the latest media "moral panic"
to divert attention from deep rooted social and individual problems.
Nobody takes his/her own life because of a video game. It's rather like
suggesting the boys at Columbine killed their classmates, teachers and
themselves because they watched The Matrix and listened to Marilyn Manson. 

Rhiannon 


Rhiannon Bury
Assistant Professor 
Wilfrid Laurier University
Waterloo, ON, N2L 3C5
Canada




air-l at aoir.org writes:
>This week's "48 Hours" on CBS featured a story about 
>video game 'addiction', especially those playing 
>"EverQuest" by Sony.  One sad tale of a twentysomething 
>young man who killed himself after his favorite 
>character was destroyed.  His mother thinks suicide was 
>due to the game.
>
>What amazed me was that most of the people in the story 
>were not teenage boys, but men in their 20s and 30s.
>
>Any real research out there on this subject of on-line 
>gaming addiction?
>
>Thanks,
>
>Valdis Krebs
>http://www.orgnet.com
>
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