With more and more people talking about suicide and major life disruptions coming from playing hours and hours of video games, officials with the World Health Organization are preparing to classify a new type of addiction: gaming disorder.
The news has parents and families starting to wonder about that XBox or Playstation.
“As parents I think we are all concerned about how the kids spend on line or on video games,” said Dr. Erick Messias, a teaching psychiatrist at UAMS. “The question is how much is too much? It is too much when it's affecting other areas of life so all you're doing is devoting time to video games.”
For adults who enjoy gaming, they say they can see the signs.
“Every time that you go online on your console, you see them online,” said Corey Boyte after trading some games at a local store with his nephew Hunter. “It's a trend that you just notice.”
Dr. Messias said his research indicates trouble starts when kids spend more than four hours on the game on a school day. The W.H.O. designation will allow other countries the foundation to create laws, like South Korea, where problems are so rampant, lawmakers are considering shutting down servers after midnight across the country.
Here in America we will have to wait for the American Psychiatric Association to add the disorder to its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. Until then, keep looking for telltale signs.
“If they're missing homework. If their grades are going down. If they are missing sleep,” said Dr. Messias.
“We're aware of it and we reach out to each other,” Boyte said. “If we feel like that may be an issue with one of our fellow gamers, we take the steps to intervene.”
Dr. Messias said we need to act now with virtual reality on the horizon.
“We'll be ready when the whole new wave of virtual reality games comes through,” he said. “They will be immersive and they will take people away from lots of other things.”
Doctors and other gamers point out that there are many good things that come from video games.
Kids become socially engaged, they become comfortable with technology and in some cases become better writers.
But definitely watch the amount of time they spend playing.