Altered Autonomic Functions and Distressed Personality Traits in Male Adolescents with Internet Gaming Addiction

Abstract

Internet gaming addiction (IGA) has been associated with many negative health outcomes, especially for youth; however, few studies have examined the physiological parameters and personality features related to this addiction. This study aimed to identify differences in autonomic functions and distressed (type D) personality traits among Korean adolescent males with and without IGA. In a cross-sectional study, 68 adolescent males were recruited in a Korean city using convenience and snowball sampling methods. For each subject, heart rate variability (HRV) parameters were measured as autonomic functions and questionnaires were used to identify IGA and type D personality traits. Data were analyzed using descriptive analyses, t tests, χ tests, and Pearson's correlation. Most HRV parameters significantly differed between the IGA and non-IGA groups (all p < 0.05). Type D personality total and subscale scores, including those for negative affectivity (NA) and social inhibition, were significantly higher in the IGA group (all p < 0.001). Of the 68 subjects, 46 were classified as having type D personality, with nearly twice as many in the IGA group as in the non-IGA group (p = 0.002). Type D personality total scores negatively correlated with the logarithmic value of total power and low frequency among the HRV parameters (both p < 0.05). Results showed that excessive Internet gaming was related to alterations in autonomic functions and distressed personality traits in male adolescents. These findings provide further understanding of the IGA phenomenon and highlight the need for interventions that address male adolescents with IGA.

Internet Gaming Disorder and Its Associated Personality Traits: A Systematic Review Using PRISMA Guidelines

“…Regarding the geographic characteristics of the included studies, five studies were from Germany (Borzikowsky and Bernhardt 2018;Braun et al 2016;Laier et al 2018;Müller et al 2014;Walther et al 2012), three were from South Korea (Kim et al 2008;Kim et al 2016;Lee et al 2017), two from Spain (Gonzalez-Bueso et al 2018;Torres-Rodríguez et al 2018), two from China (Hu et al 2017;Li et al 2016), two from the UK (Collins et al 2012;Mehroof and Griffiths 2010), one from Turkey (Kırcaburun et al 2018), one from Belgium (Schimmenti et al 2017), one from Norway (Wittek et al 2016), one from Hong Kong (Wang et al 2015), and one from Taiwan (Chiu et al 2004). Additionally, there were two crosscultural studies; the first one collected data from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland (Lehenbauer-Baum and Fohringer 2015), the second collected data from USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and European Countries (Charlton and Danforth 2010).…”

“…The vast majority of the included studies recruited more male participants (n = 11,204; 67.76%) than female participants (n = 5331; 32.24%). All the studies included adult samples apart from seven studies that included adolescent samples (Gonzalez-Bueso et al 2018;Hu et al 2017;Kim et al 2016;Li et al 2016;Torres-Rodríguez et al 2018;Walther et al 2012;Wang et al 2015). Seven studies comprised student samples (Chiu et al 2004;Hu et al 2017;Kim et al 2016;Li et al 2016;Mehroof and Griffiths 2010;Walther et al 2012;Wang et al 2015); four studies included outpatients (Gonzalez-Bueso et al 2018;Lee et al 2017;Müller et al 2014;Torres-Rodríguez et al 2018); nine studies included gamers (Borzikowsky and Bernhardt 2018;Charlton and Danforth 2010;Hu et al 2017;Kırcaburun et al 2018;Kim et al 2008;Laier et al 2018;Lehenbauer-Baum and Fohringer 2015;Schimmenti et al 2017;Wittek et al 2016); and with the exception of three studies (Hu et al 2017;Laier et al 2018;Wittek et al 2016), all studies that included gamers comprised Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) gamers.…”

“…Some studies reported that IGD was positively correlated with negative valence (i.e., being demanding, needy, and eager to impress) (Charlton and Danforth 2010), schizotypal traits (Schimmenti et al 2017), narcissism (Gonzalez-Bueso et al 2018; Kırcaburun et al 2018;Kim et al 2008), psychoticism, disinhibition (i.e., being irresponsible, impulsive, and a high risk taker), antagonism (i.e., being hostile, manipulative, deceitful, and callous), detachment (i.e., having restricted affectivity, anhedonia, suspiciousness, and intimacy avoidance), negative affectivity (i.e., being emotionally labile, anxious, and submissive) (Laier et al 2018), sadism (i.e., demonstrating cruel and deviant behaviors and inflicting intentional pain on others to feel powerful) (Kırcaburun et al 2018), inhibition (which refers to an avoidant personality disorder's pattern at DSM-III-R), introversive (which refers to a schizoid personality disorder's pattern at DSM-III-R), and Type D personality traits (which is defined as a combination of negative affectivity and social inhibition) (Kim et al 2016). The same studies also reported that IGD was predicted by negative valence (Charlton and Danforth 2010), schizotypal traits (Schimmenti et al 2017), narcissism (Kırcaburun et al 2018;Kim et al 2008), sadism (Kırcaburun et al 2018), grit (Borzikowsky and Bernhardt 2018), negative affectivity, detachment, and psychoticism (Laier et al 2018).…”

“…The structural characteristics of the games (Griffiths and Nuyens 2017), as well as gamers' motivations such as coping with negative emotions, achievement (advancement and competition), socializing, and immersion (role-playing and escapism), are frequently cited as factors in the etiology of IGD (Kuss 2013). In addition, personality traits also appear to be important determinants in the enduring disposition of IGD and with controlling psychosocial, executive, and motivated behaviors (Kim et al 2016). Scholars have considered that personality determinants of an individual's behavior (McCrae and Costa 1987) are closely associated with addictive behaviors (Floros and Siomos 2014).…”

Relationships of Internet Gaming Reasons to Biological Indicators and Risk of Internet Gaming Addiction in Korean Adolescent Male Game Users

“…This study is a multi-phase cross-sectional study that included individual interviews, focus group discussions, survey questionnaire, and biological analysis. It was a part of larger study that examined the role of autonomic nervous system in development of IGA among adolescent males [28,33,34].…”