Parents and kids alike are aware that video games are a big part of the American youth culture. Some parents insist that their kids are, in fact, addicted to video games. Is this simply parents complaining about their kids’ hobbies that they may or may not appreciate, or is there scientific support for pathological video game use among a significant number of American children and teenagers?

A recent study by Douglas Gentile with Iowa State University and the National Institute on Media and the Family, (Minneapolis, Minnesota), sought to study the behaviors of children and adolescents regarding video games.

An addiction indicates not that the subject engages in a behavior frequently or even for long periods of time, but that the behavior damages multiple levels of functioning. Some examples would be damage to family, social, school, occupational and psychological functioning.

The study sampled 1,178 U.S. residents aged 8 through 18. The research measured video game use based on 11 criteria based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). The criteria were similar to those used to identify pathological gambling. Subjects that exhibited at least half, or 6, of the symptoms were identified as pathological video gamers.

The symptoms used to define pathology included salience (the activity dominates the person’s life), euphoria or relief, (the activity provides a “high”), tolerance, withdrawal symptoms, conflict (the activity leads to conflict with persons close to the participant), and relapse.

In addition to pathological indicators, the study also assessed the participants’ video game habits. They measured weekly amount of video game play, knowledge of game ratings, household rules for game use, school performance, attention difficulties, and other indicators.

In the national sample of 8- to 18-year-olds, 8.5% of participants showed a pathological pattern, indicating a rating of at least 6 out of 11 indicators were exhibited.

Pathological gamers spent twice as much time as non-pathological gamers playing video games, were more likely to have a video game system in their rooms, had lower academic performance, and were more likely to feel that they were addicted to video games.

The results indicate that 88% of American youth between the ages of 8 and 18 at least occasionally play video games. Though video game usage seemed to yield a similar pattern relative to age that television viewing exhibits, with video game frequency playing decreasing in high school, the study found that adolescents play video games with less frequency as they get older, but with longer playing time per session.

Overall, only about half of the participants indicated that their homes had rules about video games, and a large percentage of the youth owned M-rated games.

The core limitation for this study is that it does not provide evidence for the possible causal relationships among the variables studied. For instance, it may be possible that pathological gaming causes low academic performance, or it could be as probable that children that have poor school performance seek out video games as a respite from the demands of academic and social pressures.