There are varying beliefs on the effects of gaming on the gamer. This paper aims to compare a scholarly scientific article, “Pathological Video Game Use Among Youths: A Two-Year Longitudinal Study” with a popular media adaptation of the same experiment, “Risks, Consequences of Video Game Addiction Identified in New Study”. The study, “Pathological Video Game Use Among Youths: A Two-Year Longitudinal Study”, studies the risks and consequences associated with video game addiction and aims to define when a gamer should be considered a pathological gamer and the effects of video game addiction. The research question is as follows: Is pathological gaming a primary or secondary problem and what are the results for individuals who take up or stop pathologically gaming? The researchers measured the prevalence and length of the problem of pathological gaming or Internet use in order to identify risk and protective factors. (Gentile et al., 2011, p. 319)
The media article, “Risks, Consequences of Video Game Addiction Identified in New Study” took a negative approach to the research question at hand. The article treated video game addiction as a serious problem. It failed to address any other opinions regarding gaming addiction. It focused on pathological gaming as a reality and did not treat the research question as the question it is. The popular media article included statistics from other video game addiction studies in other countries. These were used to support the negative stance the media article was taking on the issue. The article treated their stance as factual and chose only quotes were in support of their opinion. The media article gave the public what they were interested in hearing, not both sides of the issue. ...
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...research article does not provide enough information to clearly define pathological gaming. The study, also, did not discover any precautions that could be taken to help video game addicts. The results require more replication to increase accuracy of the findings. (Gentile et al., 2011, p.324-326) The experimenters should repeat the experiment with a new set of subjects. Also, the gender variable should be less geared towards males in studies to come.
References
Risks, Consequences of Video Game Addiction Identified in New Study. (2011, January
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Gentile, D. A., Choo, H., Liau, A., Sim, T., Li, D., Fung, D., & Khoo, A. (2011, January
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