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Liam Vasey

Professor Bell

ENG 1201

11/1/2020

Effects of videogames on mental and physical wellness

Nowadays almost everyone is playing video games, but kids and teenagers are the ones

that play the most. As a result, teenagers are the most harmed from some of the negative effects

of video games. People play hours on end without having a thought about what this could be

doing to themselves. When playing video games you're just having fun, but playing too much

can cause many problems. Playing video games too much has the potential to harm your mental

and physical health, therefore gamers need to understand the healthy ways to retain this hobby.

While people don’t usually see people taking risks and hurting themselves playing video

games, there are still plenty of underlying issues that happen as a result of playing video games.

People don't understand that sitting down for 8 hours a day and not doing anything active isn’t

good for your health and wellbeing. Oftenly people also don’t see that they can affect you

mentally more than anything else. Video games are a mental challenge, people can get inside

your head when talking to you, they can make fun of you without a second thought. This all

happens because people are hiding behind a screen and since they are in no direct conflict, they

aren’t afraid of speaking their mind, or just trying to bring people down. The games can also

manipulate the way you think by what they are having you do in the video game. Now most

people know that these are video games and not real life, but some people hide from the real

world, almost substitute video games for the real world. When playing these games you just need

to keep yourself in check, and not play for an excessive amount of time all the time.

One of the most common downsides to playing video games is that it acts as a distraction.

It can act as a distraction from anything such as schoolwork, exercising, doing chores, etc.

Whenever someone boots up video games to play with their friends they usually get on with the

intention of playing for a while. Due to this people tend to not do something productive because
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they will get on and waste daylight hours playing video games. While this is ok in moderation, it

should not be affecting your work life. “He added that when students say playing video games is

a stress reliever, they may be wrong. This is because when they stop playing, they could

experience withdrawals. Withdrawal ends up being more of a distraction. Gentile said when

students step away from a video game, they may focus on the lack of access to the video game.

A user has set himself or herself up to be more distracted on a regular basis through this

process.” (Mortenson) I think this quote greatly shows how easily video games can become a

distraction. People just see it as a hobby or something to do for fun. It is ok to do this but after

playing so much it becomes an addiction, to where not playing in a day feels weird and you feel

obligated to play. From that point on they will constantly be thinking about video games, and just

that alone is enough to distract them from doing something important. In an academic sense, if

you are truly able to watch yourself and make sure that academics come first, then there

shouldn’t be much of an issue. It also just depends on the person, some people truly are able to

multitask and do both. While others once there are playing video games there is no getting them

off. You just need to figure out what type of person you are so that you can cater to your own

needs.

Dr. Alok Konoja clearly states that there are pros and cons of gaming. He proves that

video games can cause negative effects in academic performances, as well as cause negative

emotions that you will carry on your back the rest of the day. “Excessive video gaming is found

to be associated with positive emotions and social relationships while playing. However,

problematic and excessive video gaming is also associated with maladaptive coping strategies,

negative emotions and attitudes, low self-esteem, loneliness, and poor academic

performance.”(Konoja) This quote from an article really shows the two sides very well. As you

can see there aren't only negatives to playing video games, such as how the quote says that video

games are related with positive emotion, and social relationships. This is the driving force that

brings people back everyday to play video games. It is the underlying issues with video games

that you don’t see that causes the most problems. It lists a few problems associated with the

negatives. Such as, negative emotions and low self-esteem. I would like to touch on these more
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briefly since I believe this can affect plenty of people that play video games. Having even just

one bad game on a video game can make you angry, or annoyed. Sometimes there isn’t enough

room to always play with your friends due to limited player amounts in different games. The

effects from this can be low self-esteem and overthinking. People will turn this small debacle

into a big ordeal, thinking that their friends don’t want to play with them or that they aren't good

enough to play with the team. The biggest issue is the negative effects with academic

performances. Sometimes video games are the direct cause of not studying or doing homework.

People will play video games to put off everything till later, but when later comes around most of

the time people just don’t do it.

There are many common misconceptions about people who play video games. For

example, people usually believe that violence is a direct cause from playing violent video games.

“Some studies have yielded nonsignificant video game effects, just as some smoking studies

failed to find a significant link to lung cancer. But when one combines all relevant empirical

studies using meta-analytic techniques, five separate effects emerge with considerable

consistency.” (Anderson) This quote shows that video games and violence cannot be directly

correlated. Since the person causing violence could have many underlying issues that they were

getting out, not just because they play video games. It shows that however when using meta-

analytic techniques it does show consistency that video games can lead to an increased chance of

violence. It all just depends on the person. Violent video games only affect a small percentage of

players.”The AAP policy describes violent video games as one of many influences on behavior,

noting that many children's television shows and movies also contain violent scenes. But the

authors believe that video games are particularly harmful because they are interactive and

encourage role-playing. As such, the authors fear that these games may serve as virtual

rehearsals for actual violence.”(Mccarthy) This quote shows how video games can cause more

violence than just watching violent movies or shows. This is due to the interaction/ role playing

that you do in these scenarios when playing video games. People make video games in hopes of

people playing them, not in hopes of causing good mental health. Some games have the most

cynical ways of showing gore, drug use, and sexual content. Seeing these things at a young age
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can cause you to see these things as normal, and most teens are unfazed by the violence shown in

some of these games. Therefore, if these situations were to come up in real life, they wouldn’t be

as concerned and might be more prone to partake in an act like they have seen in the video game.

Bullying is a common action that takes place on video games and since people are hiding

behind a screen, they usually have no filter on what they are saying.”Overall, students who self-

identified as “gamers” were significantly more likely to have said that they bullied or

cyberbullied others during the previous 30 days. Specifically, 21% of gamers and 11% of non-

gamers had bullied others at school, while 11% of gamers and 6% of non-gamers said they had

cyber bullied others.”(Patchin) This study was taken with about 1500 respondents ages 12-17

that took a survey. This study was conducted to figure out if gamers are more prone to getting

bullied online or in a public place. The data shows that gamers, compared to non gamers are

almost twice as likely to get bullied in a game, or at school. This is likely because “gamers” are

usually more antisocial people and don’t have as good social skills and are more likely to be

bullied because of it. There is a lot of variability after doing more research with multivariable

data. Data shows that the different games that you are playing has an effect on your chances of

being cyber bullied. Data shows that people who play first and third person shooter games are

more likely to cyberbully or be cyberbullied. There are many reasons why it is like this. Such as

the people who are playing those types of games, or something about the game specifically that

causes it to be more prone to cyberbullying. It could also be due to the amount of time you play

those games. The more exposure to the game environment and community could be a direct

cause of bullying since you are playing the game for a longer time period.

Too many people play video games to distract themselves from real life. People that are

already introverts and then take up playing video games end distancing themselves from people

more and more. At that point they wouldn’t have many real world interactions, and could

possibly start to develop social anxiety.”But when they move out into the real world, they are

judged for these things, and since they are not used to being judged, they feel really

uncomfortable. They start to stay inside and avoid going outside. That makes the situation worse
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because then they miss out on opportunities to grow and explore. This makes their low self-

esteem even worse and their confidence continues to decrease over time.”(Konoja) This quote

proves the statement that I made above and elaborates on it in more detail. It shows that people

may be judged when having real world interactions. That in turn, pushes people away from

having more interactions in real life, and they just end up going back to playing their games.

Those types of people feel more comfortable having interactions online since you aren’t right in

front of the person, nor can they see you. I also like how this article talks about video games

hindering your ability to grow and explore. Since these people just stay cooped up in their houses

all day they are lacking knowledge from interaction and seeing things in person. This article

shows clearly how video games can push people further and farther away from the real world,

and into the virtual world that they have created through their games.

Video games also have a number of physical problems that are possible to occur. Vision

issues are a possible issue to encounter if you are playing video games for numerous hours each

day.”Extensive and fixed staring at a video game screen causes eye strain because the cornea,

pupil, and iris are not biologically equipped for chronic heavy viewing of digital images from

electronic devices. The visual system strain from frequent video game use over extended periods

may result in headaches, dizziness and in some cases, nausea and vomiting.”(Ayenigbara) This

shows the visual effects that can happen from too much exposure to video games. The headaches

are the most common cause from playing too many video games, since it's harmful to focus on a

screen for a long period of time and becomes strenuous to your eyes. Obesity is one of the

biggest struggles for some gamers. Overweight people already tend to play video games because

it is an activity that doesn’t require much activity at all. “Evidence for this potential link gains

some support from a German study reporting that boys who spend no more than 1.5 hours per

day engaged in television watching or playing video games, were 75.4% less likely to be

overweight than those who spend more than 1.5 hours engaged in the same

activity”(Ayenigbara) This study shows that more hours playing video games each day relates to

being overweight. Since most of their days are consumed with playing video games, rather than

going out and doing something active or anything that isn’t just sitting down. Gamers also tend
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to eat more when playing games which could be another reason for the correlation. Most gamers

tend to have bad posture when playing video games and this can cause musculoskeletal

problems. Injuries tend to take play in hands, back, and the neck. Issues with hands are the most

common however, because if you are playing video games for hours on end, you are essentially

just overworking your hands. Tendons and joints on gamers also tend to be more tight and sore

due to sitting down all day only using certain bones and muscles when you are playing for hours.

No, videogames are not physically demanding or dangerous, however there have been

extreme cases that have happened from video games. One that stands out to me is the death of a

3 month old child due to the videogame addiction that the parents had. This happened in South

Korea roughly 10 years ago. In Korea they have places called PC Bangs, which are 24 hour

internet cafes, where you pay an hourly fee to play video games on their devices. This couple

would regularly put the baby to bed and have 10 hour gaming sessions at the cafes and just come

back in the morning. The baby was said to be malnourished due to the parents only feeding her

powdered milk each day. The baby was already born prematurely weighing 6.4 lbs, but at the

time of death of the baby she only weighed 5.5 lbs. Yes this is only one specific extreme case of

video game addiction, however things like this are prone to happening the more you play

videogames and distance yourself from real world tasks and issues. Another rare extreme case

happened last year in 2019 with a 17 year old Thai boy. This boy was found dead in his gaming

chair, after a marathon gaming session lasting several days and nights. His desk was said to be

filled with food and drinks, with his room almost pitch black from shutting the curtains. It was

later found out that his cause of death was from a stroke caused by prolonged gaming time.

There is one more video game related death that I would like to talk about. In 2006 a girl played

the popular video game world of warcraft for 18 hours. Her daughter at the time died in her room

from dehydration and being undernourished just as the girl in Korea was. I wanted to add that

last one because it can happen easier than you think. They aren’t just harmless video games, they

are taking you away from the real world, and real problems. People just need to understand the

real life is more important than their video game world and focus on the things that really matter.

To dive deeper into the negative effects that video games have on academic performance

because video game addiction in our generation is growing. There very clearly seems to be a
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correlation between self-esteem, depression and the amount of time someone plays video games.

In a study about this, they have found that 94% of the video game addicts are males, while only

6% are females. Of these people most of them were unhappy with their social status and had a

relatively low self-esteem. When people are unhappy with themselves it tends to lead into

school, they are likely to have far less motivation to do schoolwork and those two traits can

influence worsened academic performances.”A study was conducted in the United States that

had 3,034 participants. Of the adolescents surveyed, nine percent showed signs of addiction.

Around four percent played video games at least 50 hours a week. On average, the participants in

the study played for around 20 hours a week. Students who were addicted to video games tended

to perform lower than their non-addicted peers in school.”(Zamini) This shows a direct

correlation between having a video game addiction and negative school performance. If you are

playing too many video games you won’t have time to do schoolwork, study, and interact with

people. The key to solving this issue like many others is, moderation. If you can spend some

time playing video games and some time doing schoolwork and studying, then you have a good

healthy balance.

Something that no one ever talks about is how video games can make you spend money

that you should not be spending. Almost all games nowadays cost money to buy, ranging

anywhere from $5-$100. Some video games are free to play too. The one thing that these games

both have in common is the currency for points in the game. Almost all games nowadays have

credits that you can buy in the game to unlock new items. Some items are visible where others

are almost like gambling hoping that you get the better item. This can lead people to spend stupid

amounts of money in these games. They will keep spending money to open crates or whatever

the item is in the game in hope of making more money than they spent. If you spend money on

items in some games it can make your weapons better, player better, items better, or whatever it

is. The game is almost incentivizing you to spend more money in the games so that you can be

more powerful than other players. This is exactly how all the free to play games make their

money, recently games have added new ways of to spend money by buying something called a

“battle pass”. This battle pass costs money to get, however you have to play the game and level

up to unlock the items in the battle pass. Making the players spend their money and then play for
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a longer duration of time so that they can get the items that they spent money for. People just

need to be aware of why they are spending money in a game and if it is worth it.

Video games are very rage-inducing, especially when you are trying to do something

over and over again and can’t complete the level or whatever you're trying to get. Anger and

aggression are a common issue with video games, even the non-violent games. “Hostile behavior

on the part of video gamers may be due to feelings of failure and frustration during play, rather

than a game’s violent content.”(Lopes-Rochester) I think this short quote sums up some of the

issues involved with anger in video games. People lose games in video games just like people

lose games in sports, and losing never gets easier no matter how many times it happens. Almost

a common occurrence with gamers is the breaking of a controller, people get so mad in the

games they throw it and it breaks. Yes, this does seem out of pocket however it is almost no

different from a sporting event. If you watch football you see players get mad and instigate

fights, coaches get mad and break clip boards. It happens in any competitive event that people

take place in. It happens most often when people feel like they have no control over what

happens, they feel like no matter what they do they can’t win. This in turn leads to aggression

and can cause violent outbursts which is another negative effect of video games.

Self isolation is a big issue that is involved with video game addiction. People get really

involved with their video games and will not want to do anything other than that. This can cause

issues with relationships. What tends to happen is people have to choose between the real world

or the virtual one that they are playing in, and most of the time they choose the virtual world.

This in turn leads to relationships disappearing or drifting away.”When children feel isolated

from their peers, they may turn to video games. Video games fill a child's need to belong and

desire to master tasks. ... Finally, children with higher BMIs tend to spend more time gaming and

are more likely to have social competence issues.”(Johnson) this part from an article shows how

kids turn to video games when feeling isolated. This can cause the domino effect to start, they

then might be gaining weight, losing friends, and more. People still need to have social

interactions to maintain a good lifestyle but if you are isolating yourself by doing this you might

be going down the wrong path.

All in all, video games are a hobby that countless numbers of people play each day.

However, they aren’t as friendly as they seem. They have many underlying effects that not many

people think of. People just need to get more educated about what they are getting themselves

into, because most people think it is a harmless hobby that they enjoy. When the truth of the

matter is that overplaying video games can cause issues with your mental and physical well

being. All that needs to be done is to educate people on what they are doing, so that they are able

to retain the ability to partake in this hobby.

Work Cited

Harvard Health Publishing, and Claire Mccarthy. “Violent Video Games and Young

People.” Harvard Health, 2 Aug. 2016,

www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/violent-video-games-and-young-people.

Johnson, Daniel. “(PDF) Videogames and Wellbeing: A Comprehensive Review.”

ResearchGate, 2016,

www.researchgate.net/publication/251478450_Videogames_and_Wellbeing_A_Comprehensive

_Review.

Lopes-Rochester, Melissa Greco. “Losing, Not Violent Content, Triggers Video Game Rage.”

Futurity, 9 Apr. 2014, www.futurity.org/frustration-fuels-video-gamers-aggression/.

Miller, Joshua Rhett. “Teen Video Game Addict Dies after Marathon Session: Report.” New

York Post, New York Post, 5 Nov. 2019, nypost.com/2019/11/05/teen-video-game-addict-dies-

after-marathon-session-report/.
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Mortenson, Alia. “Video Games Present Virtual Distraction.” Iowa State Daily, 10 Dec. 2015,

www.iowastatedaily.com/news/student_life/video-games-present-virtual-

distraction/article_b4d182fe-9d0f-11e5-b69e-a7443bc421cc.html.

Patchin, Justin. “Are ‘Gamers’ More Likely to Be ‘Bullies’?” Cyberbullying Research

Center, 21 Sept. 2018,

cyberbullying.org/are-gamers-more-likely-to-be-bullies.

Zamani, Eshrat, et al. “Effect of Addiction to Computer Games on Physical and Mental Health of

Female and Male Students of Guidance School in City of Isfahan.” Addiction & Health, Kerman

University of Medical Sciences, 2009,

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3905489/.