Video Games and Depression

Prolonged video game playing may increase risk for depression, anxiety.
Bloomberg News (1/16, Lopatto) reported, "About nine percent of children play such long hours of video games that they are pathological gamers, increasing risks of anxiety, depression, bad grades and social phobia," according to a study published online Jan. 17 in the journal Pediatrics. In a two-year study encompassing some 3,034 youngsters in third, fourth, seventh, and eighth grades, researchers found that "the compulsive gamers played for a weekly average of 31 hours compared with 19 for kids not deemed pathological." For study purposes, "gamers are considered pathological when their playing interferes with everyday life, and their behavior is described as being similar to that of gambling addicts, according to background information in the paper."
"Over a two-year period about 84% of those who started out as excessive gamers remained so, indicating that this may not simply be a phase that children go through," the CNN (1/17, Wade) "The Chart" blog reported. "Boys were more likely to show symptoms of excessive gaming."
HealthDay (1/17, Gordon) reported that pathological video gamers appear to "have trouble fitting in with other kids and are more impulsive than children who aren't addicted." And, "once addicted to video games, children were more likely to become depressed, anxious or have other social phobias. Not surprisingly, children who were hooked on video games also saw their school performance suffer." MedPage Today (1/17, Smith) also covered the story.
Sleeping problems may predispose adolescents to later mental health issues. The Wall Street Journal (1/18, Peterson, subscription required) reports that children with chronic sleep problems may have a greater risk for developing mental illness, according to a study in the Journal of Psychiatric Research. The investigators found that of 392 children, those who have problems sleeping between ages 12 and 14 were twice as likely to have suicidal ideation between ages 15 and 17 than those who had no trouble sleeping.