Internet gaming as addictive as gambling? Let's find out

November 5, 2016

Washington, Nov 5: Playing games on internet is not as addictive as gambling, says a new study.

The study by Oxford University is the first of its kind that has tried to measure the scale of gaming addiction in the general population using symptoms of 'internet gaming disorder' as defined by the American Psychiatric Association (APA).

gamers

Researchers from the University's Oxford Internet Institute asked nationally representative samples of men and women in four countries how they felt after gaming using the APA checklist of health symptoms.

The study investigates concerns voiced recently by the APA about a lack of good quality research into the effects of playing internet games.

Researchers from the University of Oxford surveyed 19,000 men and women from the UK, the United States, Canada and Germany. Over half of the sample said they had played internet games recently. Of these, between two and three percent reported they had experienced five or more of the symptoms on the list, with between one percent and half a percent saying they also had feelings of 'significant distress' in being unable to curb their play.

These rates are less than half those reported recently for gambling by the British Gambling Prevalence Survey. In that survey, 2.6 percent of those aged 18-24 and one percent of adults in the general population said they had experienced symptoms linked by the researchers with a gambling disorder.

Two years ago, the American Psychiatric Association outlined the potential problem as 'internet gaming disorder' and proposed nine standard symptoms that might characterise possible diagnoses.

The APA gave each symptom equal weight, and specified there had be an over-riding 'feeling of significant distress'. The Oxford study discusses this as a 'key feature', noting that while many gamers may feel preoccupied and distracted from other responsibilities in a similar way to a sports fan whose team has reached the finals, they are not likely to have a pathological condition unless there are feelings of significant distress.

All the study participants, recruited through YouGov and Google Surveys, completed symptom and health checklists. To be identified as a possible gaming addict, they had to report five of the nine symptoms from the APA list and also feel significant distress. Symptoms included preoccupation with internet gaming, anxiety and other withdrawal symptoms (if the game was taken away), increasing amounts of time spent gaming, loss of control, reduced interests, social withdrawal, and losing opportunities as a result of gaming. Unique to this study was an emphasis on open materials, open data, and a pre-registered data analysis plan.

Study lead author Dr Andrew Przybylski, from the Oxford Internet Institute, commented, "To our knowledge, these are the first findings from a large-scale project to produce robust evidence on the potential new problem of "internet gaming disorder". Internet games are currently one of the most popular leisure activities, but we can't leap to conclusions and assume that if 160 million Americans play them, one million of them might be addicted. Contrary to what was predicted, the study did not find a clear link between potential addiction and negative effects on health, however, more research grounded in open and robust scientific practices is needed to learn if games are truly as addictive as many fear. If clear evidence does emerge, this would have huge clinical significance as treatments for addicted gamers would vie with a range of serious psychiatric disorders in the current climate of limited health service resources."

"There were some striking findings, for instance, we found specific indicators like increasing playtime to increase excitement were reported three times more frequently than other indicators, such as risking social relationships. Importantly, the great majority of gamers - nearly three in four - reported no symptoms at all that we would link with addictive gaming behavior," Przybylski added.

The study has been published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

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Agencies
February 25,2020

Tokyo, Feb 25: Japan's Chitetsu Watanabe, recognized at 112 years as the oldest man in the world, has passed away 11 days after he received the Guinness World Record certificate, his family said on Tuesday.

Watanabe died on Sunday night, Efe news reported.

He received the official certificate on February 12 at a nursing home in Joetsu in Niigata prefecture, where he resided.

Soon after being certified as the oldest man, he began to experience a lack of appetite and respiratory problems, the wife of his eldest son told public broadcaster NHK.

Born on March 5, 1907 in a family of farmers, Watanabe moved at the age of 20 to Taiwan, where he worked at a sugar refinery for 18 years before returning to Japan after the end of World War II.

A fan of calligraphy, custard and ice cream, Watanabe told the Guinness team that the key to his long life was laughter.

He was recognized as the oldest male in the world following the deaths in 2019 of German Gustav Gerneth (in October), aged 114 years, and Japan's Masazo Nonaka (in January), at the age of 113, three months older than the German.

It remains to be seen who will be recognized after the death of Watanabe, the only male on the list drawn up by the Gerontology Research Group of the 30 oldest people in the world.

Japan has among the highest life expectancy in the world and the number of centenarians in the country has crossed 71,000, according to the latest government figures.

Since 2000, the number of centenarians censored has quintupled, raising concern for the economic outlook and future workforce of the country - where the birthrate is on a downward trend.

Out of these, 88 per cent are women.

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Agencies
July 13,2020

New Delhi, Jul 13: The Income Tax Department has facilitated a new functionality for banks and post offices to ascertain TDS applicability rates on cash withdrawal of above Rs 20 lakh in case of a non-filer of the income-tax return and that of above Rs 1 crore in case of a filer of the income-tax return.

In a statement, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said that now banks and post offices have to only enter the PAN of the person who is withdrawing cash for ascertaining the applicable rate of TDS.

So far, more than 53,000 verification requests have been executed successfully on this facility, a statement by the CBDT said.

"CBDT today said that this functionality available as 'Verification of applicability u/s 194N' on www.incometaxindiaefiling.gov.in since 1st July 2020, is also made available to the Banks through web-services so that the entire process can be automated and be linked to the Bank's internal core banking solution," it said.

On entering PAN by the bank or the post office, a message will be instantly displayed on the departmental utility: "TDS is deductible at the rate of 2 per cent if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs 1 crore", in case the person withdrawing cash is a filer of the income-tax return.

In case the person withdrawing cash is a non-filer of income tax return, the message shown would be: "TDS is deductible at the rate of 2 per cent if cash withdrawal exceeds Rs 20 lakh and at the rate of 5 per cent if it exceeds Rs 1 crore."

The CBDT said that the data on cash withdrawal indicated that huge amount of cash is withdrawn by the persons who have never filed income-tax returns.

To ensure filing of return by these persons and to keep track on cash withdrawals by the non-filers, and to curb black money, the Finance Act, 2020 with effect from July 1, 2020 further amended IT Act to lower threshold of cash withdrawal to Rs 20 lakh for the applicability of this TDS for the non-filers and also mandated TDS at the higher rate of 5 per cent on cash withdrawal exceeding Rs 1 crore by the non-filers.

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Agencies
January 7,2020

Washington, Jan 7: Facebook will ban deepfake videos ahead of the US elections but the new policy will still allow heavily edited clips so long as they are parody or satire, the social media giant said Tuesday.

Deepfake videos are hyper-realistic doctored clips made using artificial intelligence or programs that have been designed to accurately fake real human movements.

In a blog published following a Washington Post report, Facebook said it would begin removing clips that were edited--beyond for clarity and quality--in ways that "aren't apparent to an average person" and could mislead people.

Clips would be removed if they were "the product of artificial intelligence or machine learning that merges, replaces or superimposes content onto a video, making it appear to be authentic," the statement from Facebook vice-president Monika Bickert said.

However, the statement added: "This policy does not extend to content that is parody or satire, or video that has been edited solely to omit or change the order of words."

US media noted the new guidelines would not cover videos such as the 2019 viral clip -- which was not a deepfake -- of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that appeared to show her slurring her words.

Facebook also gave no indication on the number of people assigned to identify and take down the offending videos, but said videos failing to meet its usual guidelines would be removed, and those flagged clips would be reviewed by teams of third-party fact-checkers -- among them AFP.

The news agency has been paid by the social media giant to fact-check posts across 30 countries and 10 languages as part of a program starting in December 2016, and including more than 60 organisations.

Content labeled "false" is not always removed from newsfeeds but is downgraded so fewer people see it -- alongside a warning explaining why the post is misleading.

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