Study: Videogame Addiction Leads to Depression

Faladorian

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SomethingAmazing said:
Faladorian said:
I'm assuming nobody wanted to bother looking into it. They wanted to dismiss it as a cookie-cutter diagnosis. I'm just saying, if you are clinically depressed it means your brain does not produce enough of the chemicals that make you happy, or even content. The only way around that is medication, or feeding an addiction (which is never a good idea). We're blurring the line between the two, when clinical depression is the only one I'm talking about. Somebody who is just depressed because of things that have happened to them can "get their shit together" or find a hobby, get in a relationship, find a passion in life, etc. But (properly diagnosed) clinical depression is simply when the brain is having issues making serotonin.
And where exactly did you get this from?

Did you go into someone's brain and find that someone was serotonin deficient? Or are you just going to buy into what the corporate controlled medical community's word?
Okay you really need to give your conspiracy theories a rest. While I agree that governments are always very corrupt, if we can not only perform postmortem autopsies and find these chemicals, but use electrodes, MRIs, etc. to monitor brain activity in the living, when people say that feeling like crap is because you dont have enough of the chemical in your brain that, oh I don't know, doesn't make you feel like crap, I'm not opted to disagree with that logic.
 

Azure Sky

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Loonerinoes said:
Cue 101 anxious and angry replies of how "NO! This is totally not true!" :p
Well, until Videogame addiction is scientifically proven (That is a long term study, not just a once off servery) much less recognized as a legitimate illness, the above study is moot.
Just another stupid misinformed collective opinion to fuel the masses that have no actual clue.

I am not going to go into any real depth on this, because I personally dislike the idea of being on the receiving end of mod-wrath. =3

However, the short end of it is that if someone has an addictive personality, then yes, they probably shouldn't be playing them to that extent.
But then again, those same people would just latch onto something else, like anime, books, collecting things etc, something that has the capacity to take large investments in time and/or effort.

Here is a perfect pair of vids that show my point clearly.
Vid one is long.

Vid 2 is the one shown in vid 1, it is put here because you cannot hear it.

SimuLord said:
Did excessive gaming cause my depression? Of course not. And this study would seem to make the same foolish chicken-and-egg argument.
Exactly! What I would give to have some global standard that prevents the spreading of misinformation. =(
 

Azure Sky

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SomethingAmazing said:
It requires someone pretty pathetic to require such things.

If they aren't pathetic, then how come other people can do it just as well?
Enough.
Either quit the Troll posting or take your misinformed arguments elsewhere please.
That's seriously enough hostile derailment.
 

saintchristopher

Goes "Ding" When There's Stuff.
Aug 14, 2009
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if a straight-up, white-coated doctor told me that I was full blown clinically ADDICTED to games, I'd probably be depressed too.
 

Azure Sky

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saintchristopher said:
if a straight-up, white-coated doctor told me that I was full blown clinically ADDICTED to games, I'd probably be depressed too.
Don't forget the superiority feeling that would come with it.
I mean, someone that is supposedly educated in this field diving headfirst into the misinformed hooplah. =s

Depressed Elitism... That is actually a scary thought... XD
 

Dexiro

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SimuLord said:
Dexiro said:
I'd argue that it works something like this:

1 - The person has a problem that results in playing games excessively (e.g. difficulty socialising or addiction)
2 - Prolonged isolation exacerbates those issues (kind of a vicious circle)
3 - The issues eventually become the subject of depression

That's kind of from personal experience and I could be wrong of course. I guess I'm arguing that addiction could be a cause but it's not the only one.
So it went for me when I was 15. My social life was in the shitter so I turned to gaming as a form of escapism, the extended isolation from other people destabilized me emotionally (even a solitary person needs some social contact and support), destabilization of emotion led to depression, depression nearly led to suicide.

Did excessive gaming cause my depression? Of course not. And this study would seem to make the same foolish chicken-and-egg argument.
Well that's kind of what I was talking about. Something happened to you that caused you to turn to gaming and isolate yourself from other people, and that lead to depression.
For you your social life messed up and caused you to turn to game excessively, for someone else it might be a gaming addiction that causes it.
 

Sarah Frazier

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I can easily say that my mind started to suffer back when I played video games day and night with only breaks for snacks and sleep. My moods went from manic highs to crippling lows with no logical reason at all, even for being in my late teens. Playing a new game would improved things, but only for a month or two before the high/low extremes started to show again. That would be when people would avoid me, which only made matters worse. Once I forced myself (with help from my husband) to leave the house for just two hours every weekend, the emotional roller coaster leveled out with only occasional rough patches that would pass after a day or two. That isn't to say that I still don't get hit out of the blue with depression that no amount of "get over it" will resolve, but it's a bit less frequent.

So in my experience gaming may not always start depression, but there's a good chance that it'll exaggerate existing problems that pile onto one another and tip the scales towards extreme negative patterns.
 

nofear220

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I think the depression comes from other things, like bullying/lack of true friends or people who you regularly hang out with. Which can lead to video game addiction because youre sitting at home with nothing to do...
 

d43dr34m3r

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Is there any addiction that doesn't lead to depression? Alcohol, drugs, pornography, food, sex, and any other addiction I can think of will most likely lead to depression upon reflection on the hours wasted and negative consequences (physical and mental damage, relationships allowed to decay or end, a negative reputation built up in the social circles still occupied). It's pretty much tautological to say that addiction causes problems.
 

SimuLord

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Aug 20, 2008
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Dexiro said:
SimuLord said:
Dexiro said:
I'd argue that it works something like this:

1 - The person has a problem that results in playing games excessively (e.g. difficulty socialising or addiction)
2 - Prolonged isolation exacerbates those issues (kind of a vicious circle)
3 - The issues eventually become the subject of depression

That's kind of from personal experience and I could be wrong of course. I guess I'm arguing that addiction could be a cause but it's not the only one.
So it went for me when I was 15. My social life was in the shitter so I turned to gaming as a form of escapism, the extended isolation from other people destabilized me emotionally (even a solitary person needs some social contact and support), destabilization of emotion led to depression, depression nearly led to suicide.

Did excessive gaming cause my depression? Of course not. And this study would seem to make the same foolish chicken-and-egg argument.
Well that's kind of what I was talking about. Something happened to you that caused you to turn to gaming and isolate yourself from other people, and that lead to depression.
For you your social life messed up and caused you to turn to game excessively, for someone else it might be a gaming addiction that causes it.
I'll take it a step further---I know exactly what blew my social life to hell. It was a sports injury that made all the fair-weather friends and "get to know this guy before he makes it big" types who, seeing that my pitching arm wasn't coming back, suddenly didn't want to be my friends anymore.

At 33 it's easy to look back and say "well, fuck them." But at 14-15? When you've had your ass kissed for a good solid year (ever since I unleashed my curveball on the world in youth leagues in 1991 and had the coaches at the high school thinking "this guy's gonna win us a state title")? Life and (damn near literal) death, man.
 

reg42

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SomethingAmazing said:
Sarkule said:
It's not getting over yourself. It's getting over the depression. And the truth? The truth according to what? Your ignorant opinion?
The truth according to the fact that anyone who wasn't a complete failure could easily get over depression.
Just as a matter of interest, how old are you?
 

Nikolaz72

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Apr 23, 2009
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You can also get depressed from winter season. But then again we dont tell people to stay home in winter now do we? On a more serious note, yea i believe its completely possible.
 

Sutter Cane

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SomethingAmazing said:
MiracleOfSound said:
SomethingAmazing said:
Except for the fact that it, you know, doesn't.

If people are depressed it is their own fault.
Not really, it's the chemical imbalance's fault.
They say it is a chemical imbalance to make it seem like it isn't their fault. It helps them fool themselves into thinking that they aren't a total failure. From what I can tell, it is fairly effective. So no reason not to continue this practice.

*slams head repeatedly into a wall* you do realize right now due to this post, somewhere a psychologist is crying right? While it isn't purely chemical, you'll be hard pressed to find any disorder that is not part biological and psychological and even social in nature, heck that's why there's the biopsychosocial model. There are chemical imbalances in the depressed brain (that's why anti-depressants work) but if I remember correctly whether these imbalances are caused by depression or cause depression. In summary, your post is both ignorant and insensitive.
 

BabyRaptor

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Depressed? Not really...I raged at a boss earlier for not dropping the trinket I've been killing him every day for a month for and have yet to see, does that count?
 

The Last Hunter

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Apr 19, 2010
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Uh...huh

Ok, just have 1 problem with this study

I'm from Singapore, and I've haven't heard a whisper about this. At all

Where was I when this was conducted?



Incidentally, probably not such a good idea to poll the 8 year-olds here. Tends to get, uh, farcical
 

Phyroxis

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Apr 18, 2008
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The Last Hunter said:
Uh...huh

Ok, just have 1 problem with this study

I'm from Singapore, and I've haven't heard a whisper about this. At all

Where was I when this was conducted?



Incidentally, probably not such a good idea to poll the 8 year-olds here. Tends to get, uh, farcical
Its not published yet.
 

The Last Hunter

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Apr 19, 2010
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Phyroxis said:
The Last Hunter said:
Uh...huh

Ok, just have 1 problem with this study

I'm from Singapore, and I've haven't heard a whisper about this. At all

Where was I when this was conducted?



Incidentally, probably not such a good idea to poll the 8 year-olds here. Tends to get, uh, farcical
Its not published yet.
Well, everyone's got a friend in another school, so, you know. News travels fast, and travels everywhere