Study Finds Similarities Between Videogame Addiction, Asperger's

[mshcherbatskaya]

I'd guess my point is only that oftentimes people aren't provided with enough information to truly judge whether research is valid or not. So many who don't agree with particular results (or see results that don't agree with their mental model of how they or the world work) call it out as being invalid simply because they don't have enough information to adequately judge the constraints of the research findings.

It's a two-way street, you know? Researchers have a responsibility to produce reliable results, while the media does have a responsibility to provide enough information to understand what the results mean for the rest of us. It sounds like we're all on the same page with the media - I am interested to hear if anyone has some research study with games that they felt was completely wrong, or was shown to be untrue.

I think this is pretty much the point of my original post - I didn't have any grounds to doubt or believe the article, so my problem was not with the study (I don't really have enough info to have a problem with the study) but with the article because its approach to the science was, to my mind, pretty drive-by.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Plus, I think there is a point here: Play to many games and fail to interact with others and you can kiss goodbye to those social skills.

To be fair Fondant, that doesn't just apply to games. But would you start banning books because some children live Harry Potter?

 

[xMacx]

I think this is pretty much the point of my original post - I didn't have any grounds to doubt or believe the article, so my problem was not with the study (I don't really have enough info to have a problem with the study) but with the article because its approach to the science was, to my mind, pretty drive-by.

Absolutely. Everyone should demand more evidence to individually make an informed decision.

 

[xMacx]

Ok...attempt to summarise before bed. It's been a long day.

If you're looking for invalid research, your own digression on the WOW topic has made that invalid or at least shaky

Invalidated Research? I think so.

We can continue tomorrow if you want. I think there's about three of us reading it at this point, anyways.

I'd make the following points:

1. I think we are talking about the same thing, but I don't think it's as clean as whether we can invalidate a study just by posting criticisms. For example, if everything I said about the WOW study is true, it's still an interesting study of how a specific group responds to extensive gameplay. It just may not be generalizable to anyone other than that group. The study would still be valid, just limited.

2. I'm not following how the final report you posted invalidates research - I wasn't able to follow your train of thought. That report, by the way, made extensive use of focus groups, which are technically qualitative research, but are not controlled experimental research designed to evaluate effects of a specific manipulation. They're mainly used for idea generation. In short, that's not exactly "research" in the empirical sense of the term, and it's mainly a set of guidelines developed from focus groups and a literature review.

3. I think all of our posts are hitting on the same thing - a greater need for explanation of a studies methodology so we can make more well-informed decisions of what to conclude from a studies results.
So if you can make that a little more explicit - what research were you referring to? And how was it invalidated?

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Well, I've got to go to work in a moment (Yeah, on a sunday...)

Anyway,

1) Let's say a study 'proved' that 60% of the population has driven home drunk. Now, it would be eay enough to poke hole in the research method, giving it invalid results. (Most research studies allow for this), but to invalidate it, I'd have to create a new piece of research that proves these numbers are skewed, with a similar test grouping and having to rely on numbers that are going to be skewed anyway. And then I'm going to have to prove that my research is 'better' than the original. A very hard task.

(We'll ignore that trying to prove a single hypothesis from a multi-variable report needs to have a very high correlation.)

Let's imagine Mr. Giles Whittal is part of our study on how games cause aggression. This is a man who is clearly very aggressive in the pursuit of his 'freedom' and if he was used in the trial, then his result would be that Yes, games cause aggression.

However, it's very unlikely that he's suffering aggression due to psychological effect of gaming and likely that he's suffering aggression because of the challenge to his ideals.

Now if you're playing Half-Life or HALO, most players could tell you their heartbeat rises because you're deliberately placing yourself in a simulated combat situation. The relative point is that I can do the same thing by running around with a toy pistol. Even Tanya Byron says that challenging risks is part of growing up.

2) Final Post. The research is invalidated because of what you and Mscherbatskya identified. Mr. Giles Whittal doesn't care about the report, just the big scary picture on the front. He then goes on to say
"It's not even because of game-induced homicide or web-grooming of little girls by perverts - serious problems, but statistically low-risk."
Now, I don't believe there have ever been studies on these, yet they're reported as studies.
In fact, the research actually disproves the former [http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/08/15/video_games_and_aggression/] and the latter is one of those things that you'd NEVER get a research grant for. (The posts on "There are no girl on the intraweb" will show why you'll never get a sensible answer)

As for grooming itself, the preconception of 'groomers' before the Internet was that they were priests or teachers. I don't remember there being mass hysteria about going to church.

3) And here's the crunch from the non-scientists: People are suffering from information overload. My company's annual report was released to all of it's workers last week, and it was over 40 pages of stuff that I had trouble following, but within it were some shocking figures.

Some of our less literate staff just junked it.

So who brings us the 'TRUTH' in bite sized packages? The Media.

The general public today are confused and angry about what has happened to the World; but they don't know who to trust. So, a good clear authoritative voice (Eriksonian Hypnosis) will get them to follow.

And once they follow, they'll adapt their own stories.
"Well, Jimmy used to be such a bright kid until he started playing HALO"
Translation: Jimmy had nothing worth achieving in his life so sat studying, and now with access to lots of other children, building his social skills, he has taken to being like them."

But, and most importantly, REAL problems caused from games, of which there are some, will either be attacked by gamers for "Gamer Hate" or trotted out as 'EVIDENCE' by the bigots; and thus swept away from the public eye.

Postal, for instance, really quite disturbed me as an adult. And in a move back to the OP, the triggers of Autism/Asperger's Syndrome means that cosmetic changes to your world are terrifying to you.

Now, whilst in a gambler, these are because he's undergoing stress at returning to normality; in Aspergers/Autism, these are because he no longer has a normal world. Which is why Christmas is terrifying to them, and I'd expect to a lot of gamers and non-gamers alike.

I'm starting to digress again.

Surely Tanya's research is invalidated, despite being a well-written report, by the usage of it as a damning inditement of how our kids are preyed upon! Which I'm sure you can find in any Game related headline in the next month or so.

It's not the RESEARCH that's invalid, it's really the CONCLUSIONS that are drawn by non-scientists.

And if you want some of those, I can get thousands.

As a humourous example, because this is getting a little dark now, take the example of Cinderella.
It's such a pretty story, but have you heard the original version, where the Ugly Sister's can't quite fit their foot into the fur slipper? One cuts her toe off and one slices her heel off.

How many parents tell the 'safe/invalid' version rather than the 'realistic/valid' version?

And don't even get me started on Pochahontas.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

It's such a pretty story

I can't believe I wrote that...no more drinking whilst on the forums.

BTW Xmacx, I'd recommend looking at this http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.55033 for your invalidated studies on games.

 

[xMacx]

I appreciate the length, but you've got to read some of the things that you're posting in more depth. Also, you've got so many points buried in one post that its a losing proposition to try to address all of them. And that's from someone who's also long winded .

but let's address a couple of points quickly:

1. You don't have to run a full study to challenge a research article: See the article you cited from the escapist. The professor who responded posted a pretty cogent response to scientists not doing their due diligence in reporting results. That doesn't mean the research isn't valid, but (if his post is to be believed), there are several problematic aspects that should be investigated. Now here's what's cool about the journal process; he could have sent his blog post on to the journal as a published response, and the authors would be given space to address the issues. Then either the article is criticized or the authors clear everything up. Everyone wins.

2. One of the bigger points I'm trying to make is that science is not black and white: The author from the 2005 U of I research you pointed to as "invalidating" earlier aggression studies makes the following points:

"I'm not saying some games don't lead to aggression, but I am saying the data are not there yet. Until we have more long-term studies, I don't think we should make strong predictions about long-term effects, especially given this finding."

and

"If the content, context, and play length have some bearing on the effects, policy-makers should seek a greater understanding of the games they are debating. It may be that both the attackers and defenders of the industry's products are operating without enough information, and are instead both arguing for blanket approaches to what is likely a more complicated phenomenon."

This is a world of difference from "the research is invalidated" stance - which is (and has been) my point. Research is complicated, and attempting to overgeneralize does a disservice to both the readers and the research that has been done. In many ways, this makes non-scientists distrust results even more.

But it's hard to report results accurately, right? Consider your previous posts - you're criticizing the media for misrepresenting/overstating facts, but you've consistently cited studies you haven't read or don't understand to support your points. Further, you're often linking to studies with a misleading "headline" for your link (like your earlier post - "actually disproves the former" links to a research study that doesn't do that at all - and actually has ties to the same generalization problems I mentioned with the WOW studies).

You can't criticize the media for doing the exact same thing you've done throughout this thread (unless, or course, you're willing to avoid doing it yourself). Reporting science accurately is pretty difficult.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

I appreciate the length, but you've got to read some of the things that you're posting in more depth. Also, you've got so many points buried in one post that its a losing proposition to try to address all of them. And that's from someone who's also long winded .

Remember I'm working on the fly; most reports contain their summaries in the first or last paragraphs. If I had more time, and didn't have to get off to work; I'm sure I could find some solid evidence.

but let's address a couple of points quickly:

1. You don't have to run a full study to challenge a research article: See the article you cited from the escapist. The professor who responded posted a pretty cogent response to scientists not doing their due diligence in reporting results. That doesn't mean the research isn't valid, but (if his post is to be believed), there are several problematic aspects that should be investigated. Now here's what's cool about the journal process; he could have sent his blog post on to the journal as a published response, and the authors would be given space to address the issues. Then either the article is criticized or the authors clear everything up. Everyone wins.

Problem. You send this to a journalist and the authors have to find it or be bothered with it. Like I said, there's been a number of VERY high level researches that have been completely debunked but the authors just say "Well, nyah!"

2. One of the bigger points I'm trying to make is that science is not black and white: The author from the 2005 U of I research you pointed to as "invalidating" earlier aggression studies makes the following points:

"I'm not saying some games don't lead to aggression, but I am saying the data are not there yet. Until we have more long-term studies, I don't think we should make strong predictions about long-term effects, especially given this finding."

Probably the best lager? If Research A says X cause Y, and B says we have no evidence to link X with Y yet; then A is still wrong.

"If the content, context, and play length have some bearing on the effects, policy-makers should seek a greater understanding of the games they are debating. It may be that both the attackers and defenders of the industry's products are operating without enough information, and are instead both arguing for blanket approaches to what is likely a more complicated phenomenon."

I'm getting on in life. I've seen the War on Video Nasties, Rock Music, Roleplaying Games, LARP, Drugs happen time and time again.
Bad news gets a blanket response. It's no use Dr. Frankenstein saying "But it's my first experiment" to the torch wielding villagers.
But the media knows this, some of the videogame enthusiasts are often socially inept and all they need to do is link ONE case to a video game and "WE MUST BAN THESE EVIL GAMES!!!!!!"

Do you blame us for trying to stop them as soon as possible? Even at it's greatest level of addiction and aggression causing that's been reported, Games cause less problems than Smoking, Drink, Drugs, Cars, Stress, Religious Beliefs, Books etc.

Asperger's is just the new Schizophrenia. If the psychiatrists don't know what's wrong, and can't find evidence of abuse in the family, then it's Asperger's.

Funny, if you took anyone's Mother and showed her your filty teenager bedroom, she'd be going through a similar state of anxiety to someone suffering from Asperger's. Rapid response to regain control, lack of communication except in aggressive tones, unemotional state.

This is a world of difference from "the research is invalidated" stance - which is (and has been) my point. Research is complicated, and attempting to overgeneralize does a disservice to both the readers and the research that has been done. In many ways, this makes non-scientists distrust results even more.

Hrmm..I do get the feeling you're playing Devil's Advocate here though. Most of the time, even scientists, just read the conclusion and pick out the bits they need.

But it's hard to report results accurately, right?

Then how hard must it be to disprove accurately?

I can come up with studies to show anything I want; but disproving studies, in general, are far less prevalent.

Consider your previous posts - you're criticizing the media for misrepresenting/overstating facts, but you've consistently cited studies you haven't read or don't understand to support your points.

A little unfair, I was providing studies at speed do provide you with examples.

Further, you're often linking to studies with a misleading "headline" for your link (like your earlier post - "actually disproves the former" links to a research study that doesn't do that at all - and actually has ties to the same generalization problems I mentioned with the WOW studies).

Headline writing is a whole other business.

You can't criticize the media for doing the exact same thing you've done throughout this thread (unless, or course, you're willing to avoid doing it yourself). Reporting science accurately is pretty difficult.

So again, if reporting science is difficult, bring in someone who can. Can you?

 

[xMacx]

I have to go off in a few minutes as well - I'm not going to be on through the day, but will address some points later on.

Just to keep the discussion conceptually clear - which stance are you trying to take? Are you arguing about (1) the validity of gaming research or (2) media failures to adequately report research findings?

They're different tracks; my main reason for saying that is you're using one to defend the other.

You argue that invalid research is difficult to amend. I reply with a method that academia uses quite frequently. You return with media's failure to follow up with further findings.

Which would make sense if you and I are discussing media failures only; but we're not - at least as far as I was aware. The media's responsibilities has been covered in several posts earlier in this thread and (as far as I can see) has been brought to a rough consensus. We're talking about valid and invalid research findings as they relate to games; I think we all agree that the media doesn't do a great job of fully explaining the findings they do report.

And you're still talking about these supposed invalid high level studies without any evidence (or of authors going "nyaah, nyahh"). So far you've got one from a second tier social psych journal and a national advocacy report with a lit review and focus groups. Part of my larger point is that gamers perceptions of gaming research and the actual research going on don't seem to match. Right now, your statements and the reality of gaming research don't match.

One heinous point to hit quickly:

Probably the best lager? If Research A says X cause Y, and B says we have no evidence to link X with Y yet; then A is still wrong.

Absolutely not. B is only a finding of a Null Hypothesis [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_hypothesis]; take any stat or research methods class, and one of the first things you learn is interpreting the Null is absolutely the wrong thing to do...pretty much ever. Seriously. This is a horrible statement.

 

[xMacx]

A few others that are more off-topic side convos if you want to have them:

I'm getting on in life. I've seen the War on Video Nasties, Rock Music, Roleplaying Games, LARP, Drugs happen time and time again.Bad news gets a blanket response. It's no use Dr. Frankenstein saying "But it's my first experiment" to the torch wielding villagers.
But the media knows this, some of the videogame enthusiasts are often socially inept and all they need to do is link ONE case to a video game and "WE MUST BAN THESE EVIL GAMES!!!!!!"

Do you blame us for trying to stop them as soon as possible?

There's great Op-Ed article by Douglas Wilson on Gamasutra about why this type of advocacy can be detrimental ("Ceci N'est Pas Une Gamer") - he does a fine job, so I'm not going to rewrite his thoughts. Definitely check it out, though.

Funny, if you took anyone's Mother and showed her your filty teenager bedroom, she'd be going through a similar state of anxiety to someone suffering from Asperger's. Rapid response to regain control, lack of communication except in aggressive tones, unemotional state.

In my defense, it was the very early 90's; filthy teenage bedrooms were all the rage. And my Mom clearly communicated her thoughts in a pretty emotional manner .

Hrmm..I do get the feeling you're playing Devil's Advocate here though. Most of the time, even scientists, just read the conclusion and pick out the bits they need.

Ouch! From a scientist, I assure you that's not the case. You might quickly read the abstract & conclusion to figure out if a studies worth your time to read, but if it's something you're going to really take a hard look at, then you check out the rest of the paper.

A little unfair, I was providing studies at speed do provide you with examples.

Absolutely fair. You're criticizing the media, but essentially you're in the same spot - trying to provide studies and context at high speed. And what happened? The effort was in the right place, but you ended up misstating the importance of several studies, and provided several overreaching global statements on the validity of gaming research. How different is that from what the media do? You essentially got put in their place yesterday trying to defend a position, and responded in exactly the same way.

Headline writing is a whole other business.

My sentiments exactly - see my previous post. Again, let's agree on what we're talking about - if you want to discuss media misrepresentation, we should start a different thread. My point there is only that you're doing exactly what you criticize the media for doing when you attempt to defend your position. And I still think it's a different topic from our main discussion.

So again, if reporting science is difficult, bring in someone who can. Can you?

Can and do regularly. PM me if you want more info.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

I'll respond later. Just in.

I'm still unsure why a Hypothesis is not overturned by a Null-Hypothesis though. If A states "It does" and B says "It doesn't in this case", doesn't A at least turn into "It can do"?

 

[xMacx]

cool - pretty sure we're the only two reading this thread.

Also at work, but will post more on the issues with interpreting a null finding. The short version is the lack of evidence for effect A in a given study is not considered evidence that effect A does not exist. This is usually tied to either issues with (a) construct validity and/or (b) methodology. But yeah, more after work.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Ok then, let's say we want to invalidate study A, how would we go about it if it used subjective interpretation?

For instance, I say that in my sample, 50% of all men wear black t-shirts on a regular basis. Could you invalidate my findings? And if not, could I then pass my research onto Next who would change their stock order to 50% black?

For my hypothesis : I selected 100 people, 50 Men, and 50 Women as a control group. These were picked randomly walking past my shop and were asked if they own a black t-shirt and if they wore it on a regular basis. 50% said yes to both questions. 25% of the women asked said yes.

The Media reports that men are twice as likely to wear black than women.

Can you disprove my research or the media's conclusion?

 

[xMacx]

I'm not quite sure how you're trying to approach this, so let's try to etch this out a little more.

First, quantity is not subjective. So if your hypothesis is that 50% of all men wear black, that's a quantifiable number. And it's not interpretation, either - that's pretty much straightforward descriptive statistics.

Further, if your argument is that 50% of your sample wears black, that's fine; a sample is just the group you pick out of the population, so not much to argue here. If you believe your sample is going to wear 50% black, that's great. The goal of most samples is to be representative of a larger population, but I'm not sure if that's what you were trying to do here. Feel free to kick in some more info if you want.

So up to this point, no problems. Your hypothesis is that 50% of all men you sample will wear black. Sure. Now in the research design and interpretation - here's where things go awry.

First, your hypothesis is to predict the proportion of men wearing black; you don't need a control group. You use a control group for comparison of the effects of some kind of treatment. Because there's no treatment, no need for a control. So get rid of that first; it doesn't have anything to do with your hypothesis. If you hypothesize that 50% of men in your sample wear black, then all you have to do is judge whether your sample approached 50% within statistically plausible limits.

Second (and this is the important part), you didn't specify who the group is you're trying to represent. You said 50% of your sample is going to wear black. What's your sample supposed to represent? If you live in East BlahBlah, and your sample is people walking down the street, then you can say that 50% of all males who walked past your store on a Monday afternoon during X season wore black. And that's really about it. The problem here is Sampling Bias [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampling_bias] - some members are more likely to sampled than another because a representative sample of everyone is likely not going to walk by your door.

So if your hypothesis was that 50% of the men you sampled (i.e., men on high street in location at a specific time) wore black, then you're fine. If you were trying to generalize to anything else - day, time, rest of the town, country, etc., then your results would not be considered valid. Your sample size would be too small and too restricted to adequately come to the conclusion that anyone outside of the exact area at the time you sampled wears black 50% of the time (i.e., your design has problems with sample size and selection bias). Even then, you'd want to take repeated measures to ensure you didn't sample on "everybody wear black day", or when the goth convention is in town.


That's part of the point I'm trying to get across - every study tells you something; it's never as simple as right or wrong, or valid/invalid. But the better the study is controlled, and the more representative a sample used, the closer you can be to representing the characteristics of a population.


The media's conclusion is also false - because you only sampled a small niche of the population, the results are not generalizable; they ran afoul by stating "men" with no qualifiers (which is akin to saying "all men", which is most likely false.

Also, remember this is different from research being valid or invalid; this is media misrepresentation, and not really the crux of what we're talking about.


But that would also be your responsibility as a researcher not to run with an observed finding that you didn't originally hypothesize.

Try another one - this one's easy because it's actually naturalistic/observational research - so quasi-experimental at best, hence lots of things to prove problematic. Do something with a manipulation (similar to many games studies we've been talking about), and we can get something a little closer to home.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Not sure I get you on manipulation.

The problem I'm seeing though is you regard all research as accurate, but only telling you about the sample; and then in the same breath, deconstruct the research for Bias/Non-Blind etc.

Now, given this, Research will never be anything more than giving a soloution to the Riemann hypothesis; which is dandy for Scientist and Mathematicians, but has no relevance whatsoever to the Media.

The study in the OP suggests nothing more than the body's reactions to gaming is a lower scale version of what Asperger's DOES to the body. There's the big difference.

Now if Asperger's can be characterised as "heightened personality traits of neuroticism, lack of extroversion and lack of agreeableness" then I can name at least 5 other groups that have these same responses.
People who are very tired.
People who are very cold.
People on "cold turkey"
People with a cold.
Your mum in your bedroom. "Why did I bring up such a untidy boy!!"

Asperger's also has many other sub-defining traits, the main one being that it's almost certainly genetic.

Now, if I have this piece of research in my lap; is it right for me to promote it with "Gaming addicition linked to Genetics."?

And much more importantly, and holds the crux of the invalidation of research, what was the team's original hypothesis and how did it come about?

 

[xMacx]

Not sure I get you on manipulation.

Manipulation is your experimental treatment, or your independent variable; in an experimental study it's what you're altering to investigate an effect. See the description of independent variables here [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_variable].

Independent variables are also talked about in observational studies like the study you proposed. For example, your study proposed a number of independent variables (location, time of day, day of the week, events occurring on that day) that could affect your measurement; that you didn't control for in measuring your hypothesis, which limits what you can actually conclude from your results at best.

The problem I'm seeing though is you regard all research as accurate, but only telling you about the sample; and then in the same breath, deconstruct the research for Bias/Non-Blind etc.

Per the "all science as accurate" comment - reread my post. If your hypothesis was "50% of all men in the world wear black", then it's certainly inaccurate. If your hypothesis was "50% of the men who walked in front of my shop on a tuesday in April wear black", then your hypothesis is accurate, just limited to the area in front of your shop.

Hence every study tells you something; how accurate the research is may be an entirely different story. Accuracy is measured by how well your results address your hypothesis.

and per the study you proposed - theres a large number of uncontrolled variables (see first section) and the population doesn't match what you actually measured. So it may be a bad study. But even a bad study produces some valid data - you'd still know what percentage of people wear black outside your store on a given day of the year. You just wouldn't be able to say anything other than that.

Now, given this, Research will never be anything more than giving a soloution to the Riemann hypothesis; which is dandy for Scientist and Mathematicians, but has no relevance whatsoever to the Media.

Massive overgeneralization and not even close to true. For example, most of the graphic design conventions present in your browser currently emerged from HCI research, which emerged from basic perceptual research. All of the above were reported in the media as it occurred.


going to work, will post more on the study you proposed in a minute. For starters, though, you might want to look at the study summary again: does the study really suggest that the body's reaction to gaming is similar to the effects of aspergers? I think you're overgeneralizing their results.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Per the "all science as accurate" comment - reread my post. If your hypothesis was "50% of all men in the world wear black", then it's certainly inaccurate. If your hypothesis was "50% of the men who walked in front of my shop on a tuesday in April wear black", then your hypothesis is accurate, just limited to the area in front of your shop.

And what was the OP's original hypothesis? There's still no answer. The study showed that 'individuals who showed more signs of addiction to videogames showed heightened personality traits of neuroticism, lack of extroversion and lack of agreeableness. All three are considered signs of Asperger's, described as "a variety of high-functioning autism."'

This means the hypothesis proved is that people who have a greater addiction to video games share traits with the sufferer's of Aspergers syndrome.

That means it's impossible to link it to either 'Videogames are addictive' (because we're looking at addictive personalities), 'Some Gamers have Aspergers' (which must be true given relative populations statistics) or 'Addictive Personalities resemble Aspergers Syndrome' (because the research focussed on games).

So, whilst it MAY be accurate, it's invalid to use it to prove those hypothesis because subset A links to subset B, not set A to set B.

It tells us something, but again, it's like proving Riemann's hypothesis or Pythagorus's Theoreum. Great use to Scientists, but inapplicable to the Mass Media.

It has to be an overgeneralisation because we're talking about all the Research ever covered.

Freud's Psychosexual Research is riddled full of barn door sized holes; but is still considered to be the basis of Psychology. That's what, I think, Mschebatskaya and my problem is (At least I think it is for her, she could pop in and tell me if I'm right/wrong )

Bad Research can promote more bad research without being overturned; and research based on bad research is invalid, whether or not it produces valid results.

To take your example, 'most of the graphic design conventions present in your browser currently emerged from HCI research, which emerged from basic perceptual research. All of the above were reported in the media as it occurred.'

Does this mean that the HCI research is right? Or that WYSIWIG is just the only thing we've been left with. Windows 3.1 was the product of that research and as was shown up to Vista, there are serious design flaws in this kind of apparatus.

If you doubt me, just google for "[expletive] Windows".

 

[xMacx]

First, hypotheses don't "prove" anything. You're thinking mathematical proofs, which is a different thing altogther. Throw the concept of "proving" something out the window for this discussion.

Second, you're restating what was already talked about on page 1 and 2;
as in:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation

So of your three statements, two are causal - no suprise they don't fit. The third, which is not causal, you can comfortably state - that given their sample, people who scored higher on video game addiction shared personality trait scores similar to those seen in Aspergers syndrome.

Why did you think you couldn't say this? if by subset you mean personality scores, then Set A (Game Addiction) and Set B (Aspbergers) share specific characteristics of measure Y (Personality Scores).

That the study shows pretty clearly.

Finally, whoever told you Freud is still relevant lied. And Psychoanalysis is not the same thing as empirical research. And Freud was not ever the basis of Psychological research (or psychology as a whole). Not by a long shot.

 

[xMacx]

To take your example, 'most of the graphic design conventions present in your browser currently emerged from HCI research, which emerged from basic perceptual research. All of the above were reported in the media as it occurred.'

Does this mean that the HCI research is right? Or that WYSIWIG is just the only thing we've been left with. Windows 3.1 was the product of that research and as was shown up to Vista, there are serious design flaws in this kind of apparatus.

If you doubt me, just google for "[expletive] Windows".

Remember that you're talking about the application of research findings; when you start to talk about design flaws, you've slid into another area completely.

My only point was to illustrate how ubiquitous psychological research is; almost all of the tools you use on a daily basis have been shaped by human factors & usability research. To this end, research is anything but an insoluble mathmatical proof (as you suggested in the previous post).

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

The third still stands as false because I specified 'Addiction' rather than 'Game addiction'.

The real problem is the way it has been stated. Aspergers is the control group which the Addiction is being compared to. Subset A is Game Addicts and subset B is Aspergers sufferers. This forms part of set A (Gamers) BUT the five other subsets that I talked about earlier ALSO show this link.

Therefore we're not talking about Gaming Addiction, but Aspergers.

So the study is useful to Aspergers Suffers, as we are able to combat addiction and thus work on the flaws that Suffers are prone to; but does not show that Gaming Addicts suffer in the same way as Aspergers (Given that Aspergers is a genetic deficiency and Addiction is a mental deficency).

Finally, whoever told you Freud is still relevant lied.

Good, he was a fruit basket.

I'm still very puzzled by your take on research though. You promote the uses of psychological research, but then point out how wrong it can be, and then hold it as useful unless proven wrong, and then say that it can't be proven wrong, just limited.

And then ask us to find studies that are proven invalid, when you can't prove anything?????

The original study is of use to studies of Addiction; but almost worthless to studies of Addicts. And certainly not news that relates to Gaming.

Remember that you're talking about the application of research findings; when you start to talk about design flaws, you've slid into another area completely.

You asked about HCI research, and I brought up WYSIWIG, now there's no control group to test against that because almost all browsers use it. I still like DOS and use it occasionally.
Just because Windows uses WYSIWIG and Windows is the most used operating system does not mean that WYSIWIG is the best use of this perceptual research.

I do get the feeling we're not going to agree on this though: So I'll see if we can summon up the things we do believe to be true.

1) Scientific Research often brings some significant insights.
2) The Media are often at fault by under/overstating some of the findings.
3) Bad research can come of using bad research.
4) You can prove anything with statistics.

Where we disagree.

You believe that Research is valid until proven false, I believe that Research can still be bad without being invalid.

I think that's it?