• Substance-Related Disorders
• Video Games & Addictive Potential

Internet and computer game dependency is not just a symptom of other psychiatric conditions, but should be a diagnostic entity in itself, according to new research presented at the American Psychiatric Association's Annual Meeting. Computer games played on the Internet seem to contain an addictive potential comparable to substance abuse disorders, the authors said.

The research poster, Diagnostic Aspects of Pathological Internet use: A Prospective Study on Psychiatric Phenomenology and Comorbidity of Internet Dependency (NR7–02), was presented by Bert T. te Wildt, MD, Hanover Medical School, Hanover, Germany and suggests that this new diagnostic entity might best be labeled as Internet dependency or a more encompassing, media dependency.

Patients seeking psychiatric assistance and fulfilling the criteria for pathological Internet use were compared to a group of healthy controls. The average time spent in Cyberspace was 6 1/2 hours per day, mostly in multiplayer online role-playing games and online first-person shooter games. Similar to other studies, they found mostly depressive, anxiety, and personality disorders exist alongside Internet dependency. The study however, cannot explain whether a depression or anxiety disorder is a cause or effect of the pathological Internet use.

According to most previous studies, the average patient presenting with pathological Internet use is a young male who has withdrawn himself from real life and escapes into a virtual parallel world, mostly to alleviate his lack of self-esteem and self-confidence by playing the hero he could not be in real life. The addictive potential of Internet and online games may be especially relevant for children and adolescents, who ever more often seem to develop a dependency on the Internet and computer games without a distinct comorbid pathology the researchers argue.

Researchers concluded, “against the background of an ever increasing number of young and adult Internet dependent individuals … it has become undisputable that Internet dependency has to be taken seriously from a medical point of view.”

In the meantime, however, the researchers suggest that psychiatrists “must not forget to examine the patients for comorbid psychopathology, in order to provide a comprehensive treatment regimen. Yet, to sufficiently understand and treat those patients, psychiatrists also have to be empathically interested in the parallel virtual lives of their patients.” Some patients, the researchers note, may need an antidepressant to treat depression or anxiety, and psychotherapeutic approaches to address the media dependency to help them re-establish real life as an attractive and fulfilling existence.

Players of violent video games have significantly higher feelings of aggression and differences in brain activity during both cognitive motor activity and resting periods, according to research results to be presented by at the American Psychiatric Association's Annual Meeting in New Orleans.

There has been increased interest in the influence of violent video games on the behavior of players, and recent research shows an increase in aggression due to the intensive use of first-person shooter games (FPSG) but little is known about the influence of the games on the brain activity.

Researchers led by Gregor R. Szycik, PhD, Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany, investigated intensive use of first-person shooter games on the brain function of young male adults, particularly looking at both the possible impact of such games on morphological and functional structure of the brain and its relation to processing cognitive tasks. Subjects had to complete questionnaires and underwent fMRI scanning while they relaxed.

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The groups differed in the aggression scores, with the FPSG players showing significantly higher levels of felt aggression. The research also showed differences in brain activity during cognitive and motor resting periods between the FPSG users and the control group. “This frontal increase in default-mode network (DMN) may indicate executive dysfunctions of FPSG users having influence on the high scores in the aggression questionnaire,” the researchers concluded.

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