Playing video games is a rite of passage for many adolescents, but for some, it becomes the first step to a gaming addiction.
“A number one concern for parents of children and teenagers is how much screen time and how much gaming is enough gaming and how to figure out where to draw the line,” said John Foxe, PhD, director of the Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience at the University of Rochester and co-author of a study published in the Journal of Behavioral Addictions in December that discovered a key marker in the brain of teens who develop gaming addiction symptoms.
Addiction does not require a substance such as alcohol, heroin, or THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. “Behavioral addictions such as gambling, overeating, television compulsion, and internet addiction are similar to drug addiction except that the individual is not addicted to a substance, but he/she is addicted to the behavior or the feeling experienced by acting out the behavior,” wrote Alavi, Ferdosi, et al. in their 2012 study “Behavioral Addiction versus Substance Addiction.”
The Del Monte researchers examined data collected from 6,143 identified video game users ages 10–15 over four years. In the first year, researchers used an fMRI to take brain scans as participants completed the task of pushing a button fast enough to receive a $5 reward.
Researchers subsequently had the same participants answer video game addiction questionnaires over the next three years. They found that the participants with more symptoms of gaming addiction over time showed lower brain activity in the region involved in decision-making and reward processing during the initial brain scan taken four years earlier.
Previous research in adults has provided similar insight, showing that this blunted response to reward anticipation is associated with higher symptoms of gaming addiction and suggests that reduced sensitivity to rewards, in particular non-gaming rewards, may play a role in problematic gaming.
“Gaming itself is not unhealthy, but there is a line, and our study clearly shows that some people are more susceptible to symptoms of gaming addiction than others,” explained Daniel Lopez, PhD, the lead author of the study. “I think for parents, that’s really key because you could restrict children entirely from gaming, but that’s going to be really, really difficult and crucial to their development as well as their social development. But we want to know the right balance between healthy gaming and unhealthy gaming, and this research starts to point us in the direction of the neural markers we can use to help us identify who might be at risk of unhealthy gaming behaviors.”
Any mild to moderate addiction that your child may have developed can be treated at Turning Winds—including video game addictions, computer addictions, pornography, drug and alcohol addictions, cutting, and sexual addictions. Teenage clients with these kinds of addictive behaviors have been able to improve in our care.
“Turning Winds is a place for growth because you realize that you are not alone,” says drug and addiction counselor Tara Stever, LAC. “Every single human being on the face of this earth has strengths and flaws. We all have defects. It’s important to understand that and recognize that it’s okay to have them, and say ‘I will use my strengths to build on my weaknesses.’”
Turning Winds works with troubled teenage girls and boys, ages 13-18, who would benefit from clinical therapy and academic guidance as they transition to adulthood. We are a catalyst for positive change in the lives of those who spend time here and specialize in many of the most common mental health conditions such as low self-worth; behavioral problems; poor academic performance; various teen disorders which may include ADD/ADHD, depression, various addictions, spectrum disorders, and attachment disorders.
The Turning Winds model of care is based on therapeutic support in a setting that emulates a functional family system. “The simple, singular focus of our treatment program is to help each student improve their self-image and their self-confidence and change the behaviors that have been hindering their growth by teaching them to create stable patterns of living through education, process groups, and individualized treatment planning,” says Turning Winds CEO Owen Baisden.
Ready to empower your teen? Explore our life-changing treatment options today! Contact us online for more information, or call us at 800-845-1380 to start your teen’s journey to a brighter tomorrow.
