Do video games fuel mental health problems?

[Celebration]

http://ca.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idCATRE70G15J20110117

There might be trouble brewing behind the glassy eyes of kids who spend too much time and energy on video games, according to a controversial new study.

In the 2-year study of more than 3,000 school children in Singapore, researchers found nearly one in ten were video game "addicts," and most were stuck with the problem.

While these kids were more likely to have behavioral problems to begin with, excessive gaming appeared to cause additional mental woes.

"When children became addicted, their depression, anxiety, and social phobias got worse, and their grades dropped," said Douglas A. Gentile, who runs the Media Research Lab at Iowa State University in Ames and worked on the study.

[Ohio Joe]

1. So...

Letting kids with emotional problems sink all their time into non-social activities is a bad idea... Well duh. Of course this makes gaming look bad so we will use that example.

[obxhead]

2. Absolutely!

It's clearly the games, or TV, or internet that does this. It could never be the supervision of the children and their activities that is to blame.

[Celebration]

4. pretty much the point

Honestly, the research into all this is important, because it highlights the possible problems with parents allowing video games be the babysitter for their kids. The more awareness that is brought to the issue, the better, because more responsible parenting should be the result.

[Codeine]

3. Study shows kids with behavioral problems

have behavioral problems. Medical community shocked! :eyes:

[varkam]

5. Couldn't it also be that kids with naturally-occurring depression or anxiety disorders...

then spent more time playing video games as a coping mechanism?