Internet Gaming Disorder Explains Unique Variance in Psychological Distress and Disability After Controlling for Comorbid Depression, OCD, ADHD, and Anxiety

Abstract

This study extends knowledge about the relationship of Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) to other established mental disorders by exploring comorbidities with anxiety, depression, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), and assessing whether IGD accounts for unique variance in distress and disability. An online survey was completed by a convenience sample that engages in Internet gaming (N = 404). Participants meeting criteria for IGD based on the Personal Internet Gaming Disorder Evaluation-9 (PIE-9) reported higher comorbidity with depression, OCD, ADHD, and anxiety compared with those who did not meet the IGD criteria. IGD explained a small proportion of unique variance in distress (1%) and disability (3%). IGD accounted for a larger proportion of unique variance in disability than anxiety and ADHD, and a similar proportion to depression. Replications with clinical samples using longitudinal designs and structured diagnostic interviews are required.

Depression and Disordered Gaming: Does Culture Matter?

“…In addition to game genre and motivation, significant comorbidities have been supported between DG and other psychopathologies (Woelfling et al, 2008;Mihara & Higuchi, 2017;Pearcy et al, 2017;Kim et al, 2017;Adams et al, 2018;Liu et al, 2018), while addictions (such as DG) have been assumed to accommodate mood-regulation difficulties (Müller et al, 2015). In this context, depressive symptoms, including feelings of worthlessness, helplessness and hopelessness, difficulty concentrating, physical agitation (e.g., fidgeting), social isolation, and lethargic withdrawal from regular activities, have been strongly associated with addiction in general, and DG in particular (APA, 2013;Burleigh et al, 2018;Liu et al, 2018).…”

“…This model posits that individual (e.g., sociodemographic, psychopathologies, and developmental factors) and real contextual factors (e.g., family climate and community culture) may accommodate ("push towards") DG, while game factors (such as features of the game itself) may "pull" (invite) the individual (Stavropoulos et al, 2016). While the interactions between these push and pull mechanisms are reflected in previous theoretical models, researchers have highlighted that concurrent presentations of cultural and gender differences have yet to be investigated (Pearcy et al, 2017;Laconi et al, 2017).…”

“…Indeed, vertically individualistic cultural orientation endorses behaviors related to self-driven achievement, an innate cultural value that is strongly reflected in the motivational appeal of the MMORPG genre. Interestingly, research has assumed that such overlaps may result in DG behaviors (Taymur et al, 2016;Laconi et al, 2017;Pearcy et al, 2017;Stavropoulos et al, 2018b). Such associations could become strengthened alongside concurrent gamer-related psychopathological features that may 'push' to a digital escape (i.e., symptoms of depression).…”

Spanish Validation of the Internet Gaming Disorder Scale–Short Form (IGDS9-SF): Prevalence and Relationship with Online Gambling and Quality of Life

“…This approach has been defined as the move from general problematic internet use (GPIU) to specific problematic internet use (SPIU) (e.g., [5]). Consequently, research has especially focused on internet gaming [10][11][12], online gambling [13][14][15], online sex/cybersex [16,17], and social media use [18][19][20].…”

Information and Communication Technologies in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

“…For this document the specific area in psychiatry is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. The use of computer science together with specific electronic devices and psychiatry has helped to develop different technologies that use databases [1], [5], [6], [7], video games (consoles, computers, cell phones with or without internet connection) [8], [9], [10], [11], web pages [1], [7], social network [12] and controlled environments to make diagnoses, procure several reactions and perform treatments [13], [14]. These controlled environments may vary, be that they are environments controlled externally by specialists [13], [15] - [22], environments controlled externally by patients [9], [11], [15], [16], [18], [20] - [22], to even environments controlled by devices linked through internet [2].…”