The Dangers of Excessive Gaming

[TexasStooge]

By LAURA SCHREIER / The Dallas Morning News

As a freshman at the University of North Texas, Daniel Folmer would sometimes play video games for 12 hours straight. He stopped going out with friends. He sank onto academic probation.

When his girlfriend came over, he stayed in his virtual world. Then she told him something that jolted him back to reality.

"She just waited for me to look at her, or acknowledge her, or hug her or whatever, and she said she fell asleep waiting," he said. "I looked in the mirror, and I did not like who I was becoming."

Mr. Folmer sold his online gaming account and now, at 21, is a rehabilitation studies major and wants to be an addictions counselor.

Now that another hot Texas summer has arrived, many area kids are spending lots of time inside with their computers and video games.

And experts say what starts as a harmless pastime can become an escape from reality – an emotional coping mechanism – that turns into an addiction.

The trend can be seen as far away as Amsterdam, where a center recently opened to combat the problem.

Closer to home, mental health professionals who were once dismissed as alarmist are now being asked for advice on how to deal with the problem.

The trouble is not everyone has Mr. Folmer's self-discipline.

Hyke Van der Heijden, a 28-year-old Dutchman, said his gaming problem got so bad that he flunked out of college. He said pot smoking and gaming kept him emotionally sedated for years. "The games, that was my comfort zone. That was the only reality I could manage."

Mr. Van der Heijen sought help at Smith & Jones Addiction Consultants, the Amsterdam clinic that opened the video game addiction center this year. John O'Neill, who heads the Professionals in Crisis Program at the Menninger Clinic in Houston, said the number of technology addicts is increasing, if only because the options keep growing.

Chat rooms, friendship networks such as MySpace, a multitude of traditional video games and massive multiple-player games all can lead to compulsive behavior. In online games, for example, thousands of players worldwide enter a complex game that cannot be beaten and is always changing.

Dr. O'Neill said the Internet fuels other addictions as well: Gambling addicts have online casinos, and shopping addicts can buy with a credit card number and a click of the mouse.

"In a way, the Internet is like Las Vegas," he said. It offers anything you want; it seems like the perfect place to cut loose for anonymous fun; and it's open 24 hours a day.

A technology addiction is like any other, said Keith Bakker, director of Amsterdam's Smith & Jones Consulting. It's an escape from real-world problems.

Such addictions often go hand in hand with emotional problems such as depression or anxiety, and often accompany drug abuse, counselors say. But just because someone plays video games doesn't mean that person will become addicted. A person has a problem if gaming affects other areas of his or her life, such as losing sleep or neglecting relationships.

"Someone who goes with the flow, who's got great adaptability, usually is someone who's not going to get addicted," said Mary Donna Noack, clinical director of Solutions Outpatient Services in Dallas.

'Save his sanity'

Donny Behne, a Wylie middle school teacher who plays video games 15 to 20 hours a week, said his game playing skyrocketed during his stressful first year of teaching. He said his game of choice, World of Warcraft, helped "save his sanity" but took up every spare minute.

"I would come home from work, drop my stuff on the floor and sit in front of the computer until it was time to go to sleep," he said.

World of Warcraft's intricate virtual society was sheer relief, he said. The alternative – channel surfing in front of the TV and mulling what went wrong that day – would have driven him crazy, he said.

But he never missed a day of work, he said, and didn't lose much sleep because of gaming.

Not so for Mr. Van der Heijden, who says that when he looks back on his life, he's overwhelmed by what he sees – no friends, no nights out, no travels, no real job. Just year after year of Xbox, PlayStation, computer and Internet games.

He said his treatment at the Amsterdam clinic included group discussions and activities – the first time he could remember doing such things. After years of not relating to anyone, expressing emotions was a challenge.

Maressa Orzack, a psychologist at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass., said she noticed the technology-obsession trend early on. Her compulsion to play hours of computer solitaire made her see the potential for abuse, and she founded the hospital's Computer Addiction Services in 1995.

Initially, it didn't get a lot of patients or respect. "My colleagues thought I was nuts," she said.

Now her peers routinely refer patients to her, she said, and she takes four or five calls a day from people worried about a computer or video game habit.

Chase Torres, clinical coordinator for adolescent services at Harris Methodist Springwood psychiatric hospital in Bedford, said he's seen about 20 kids with computer game/technology problems since the adolescent services unit opened in September.

Student counseling centers at the University of Texas at Dallas and Texas State University-San Marcos have posted Internet-addiction advice on their Web sites, alongside help pages for well-known problems such as eating disorders or insomnia.

How much to allow

For parents, knowing how much video game playing to allow can be difficult.

Ms. Noack of Solutions Outpatient Services said parents have reason to be concerned. If kids run to the computer every time they're stressed or upset, if they don't learn to deal with other human beings, they won't have the emotional intelligence to deal with real-world problems.

Andrew Howell, assistant manager of GameWyze, a gaming center in Plano, said worried parents sometimes ask whether their kids are gaming too much when they should be playing sports.

"In some cases, I don't think little Timmy or Johnny would have gone out and played football anyway," he said. "These are the same kids who, 50 or 60 years ago, had Erector sets."

Mr. Torres at Harris Methodist Springwood hospital said setting time limits on computer usage is key. He recommends one hour a day and emphasizes the importance of social, family-oriented alternatives.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, a couple of 13-year-olds spent their day playing Battlefield Vietnam at GameWyze in Plano. The boys said they play only a few hours a week, and gaming is limited to the weekends when school's in session.

One boy said he loves to play but acknowledges there's such a thing as "too much gaming."

"It kind of warps your mind, if that's all you do," he said.

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