SterlingArcher wrote: » I find it interesting that many of the major social media companies have had huge teams of psychologists and specialists working on the addictive quality of most the social media apps.
Black Swan wrote: » Profits rule.
mzungu wrote: » ...creators, a fair number of these people (and silicon valley execs) will not let their children use them. Not because they are addictive but rather because they are an drain on attention.
Fathom wrote: » Internet attention disorder?
CHICAGO - Researchers using functional MRI (fMRI) have found differences in the brains of men and women who are addicted to online gaming, according to a new study presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA). "Internet use is an integral part of the daily lives of many young adults, and a loss of control over Internet use could lead to various negative effects," said the study's senior author, Yawen Sun, M.D., diagnostic radiologist at the Department of Radiology of Ren Ji Hospital, affiliated with the Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine in Shanghai, China. "Internet gaming disorder has become a major public health concern worldwide among both adolescents and young adults." Internet gaming disorder (IGD) is a condition characterized by compulsive playing of online games to the exclusion of other interests. Individuals with IGD often suffer significant impairment or distress and may experience negative effects at work, in school or in relationships because of the amount of time they spend playing. They also show symptoms of withdrawal when not playing. While some evidence exists that IGD is more prevalent among men, there is little existing research on differences in the structure and function of the brains of men and women with the disorder. The researchers studied 32 men and 23 women with IGD. They performed resting-state fMRI on the study participants, along with 30 male and 22 female age-matched healthy controls. Resting-state fMRI allows a view of the brain activity when it is not focused on a particular task. The study looked at relationships between brain activity as seen on fMRI and scores on the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale-11, a commonly used test to assess behavioral inhibition. The results illuminated key differences between the men and women with IGD. Men with IGD showed alterations in regional- and network-level brain function. In particular, they had lower brain activity in the superior frontal gyrus, an area of the brain's prefrontal lobe that is important to impulse control. The women with IGD did not exhibit any of these brain alterations. "Our findings demonstrated that alterations in cerebral activity are observed in men with IGD, but not in women with IGD, and that the lower brain activity in the superior frontal gyrus in men with IGD may be associated with higher impulsivity," Dr. Sun said. This and other differences apparent in the study suggest that IGD may interact with gender-specific patterns of brain function in men and women. Different rates of maturation in men's and women's brains could also contribute to gender-specific alterations in IGD, Dr. Sun noted. For instance, the prefrontal cortex, which has a central role in executive function and inhibition, matures later in men. "Men have shown lower levels of impulse control in comparison with women, and their impulse control also increases more gradually," she said. "Given the role of inhibitory control in the initiation of IGD, young men may tend to experiment with pathological Internet use to a greater degree than young women do." A dysfunctional prefrontal cortex specifically in men with IGD may be associated with high impulsivity, a finding partly consistent with those of previous studies of substance addiction. The research adds to a growing body of literature linking the behavioral problems associated with IGD to those found in individuals with substance abuse issues. "However, it remains unclear whether the brain functional and structural changes found in IGD are gaming-induced or precursors for vulnerability," Dr. Sun said. "I think future research should focus on using functional MRI to identify brain susceptibility factors relating to the development of IGD." Internet, or online, gaming has grown tremendously over the past decades. It includes social gaming, mobile gaming, and multiplayer gaming, which generates billions of dollars in revenue in the U.S. alone. Recent surveys have reported that there are more than 55 million online console gamers in the U.S. According to data measurement company Nielsen, 162 million people, or roughly half the U.S. population, live in a household with a video game console. Link: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-11/rson-oga111418.php
mzungu wrote: » Sure why not! New study finds difference in the brains of internet addicted men and women. I would be skeptical that this points to anything related to internet use. Surely differences exist in the brains of both no matter what the addiction?
Black Swan wrote: » "The researchers studied 32 men and 23 women with IGD." This is a tiny sample size, suggesting extreme caution should be exercised when interpreting results, and certainly questioning the representativeness and generalisability.
Fathom wrote: » More girl gamers. That's a cool change.
Black Swan wrote: » Awhile back I recall reading a study that looked at computer gaming by gender suggesting that the once male dominated recreational activity has been shifting by generation, with the youngest girls catching up with the youngest boys in numbers of gamers. Is this yet another long term structural gender shift occurring across-the-pond and elsewhere, and what are the consequences?
Black Swan wrote: » Gaming (Ad)diction: Discourse, Identity, Time and Play in the Production of the Gamer Addiction Myth by Rob Cover, international journal of computer game research volume 6 issue 1 December 2006.
Fathom wrote: » "Gamer Addiction Myth?"
Black Swan wrote: » Wonders if the DSM-5 needs revisions to become versed in our rapidly advancing technology age?
Thinking about gaming addiction can be productive for thinking about the relationships between new media and sociality only through breaking down the artificial distinction between the real and the virtual that is so pervasive throughout both celebrationist and alarmist discourses of new media.
mzungu wrote: » Internet addiction is a people vs machine narrative when you strip it down to the bare essentials.
Black Swan wrote: » e.g., Philosophy vs psychology?
mzungu wrote: » That too. But as a media narrative, it plays off deterministic riffs that can be found in sci-fi movies. When you did deep into it.
Black Swan wrote: » DSM past and present definitions of abnormal behaviour (if Internet addiction is in fact abnormal), suffer from being largely case study based, which is limited to the extent that you cannot generalise the results from the individual case study unit of analysis to the population unit of analysis.
Fathom wrote: » Case study limitations. Part of my science homework. Research methods.
mzungu wrote: » Exactly. One will only give us one perspective. A lot more examined closely will do a lot more.
Black Swan wrote: » Internet addiction may be a grand topic to investigate, but how would you collect the data to do so? Are there secondary or big data sources, or would a primary data collection be necessary? What type of research design would be best used? Some may suggest survey research, and they may also suggest online survey, but establishing population parameters, reliability and validity may be problematic with online survey vs other forms of data collection. Many online surveys I question if they are convenience samples of those who just happened to complete and return the survey, and consequently may not be representative of the larger population? If specific population parameters are known, and the online survey is sent to all members (i.e., census), the survey return rates I have seen recently tend to be low (below 50%), and such low rates have serious questions as to their reliability and representativeness of the population measured (e.g., see Earl Babbie who claims that return rates of 50% or more may be useful for analysis, but not below). Historically (Freud, Jung, psychoanalysis, etc.) have used the case study unit of analysis, which is highly problematic if the researcher attempts to reason from cases to populations (e.g., ecological fallacy). I have not tried to access big data regarding this Internet addiction research problem, so I do not know if such exists today. Can anyone suggest a research design to study Internet addiction?
Black Swan wrote: » Many online surveys I question if they are convenience samples of those who just happened to complete and return the survey, and consequently may not be representative of the larger population?
Fathom wrote: » Census Bureau attempts sample validation due to low returns.
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