Video games and close relations: Attachment and empathy as predictors of children's and adolescents' video game social play and socio-emotional functioning

Risk and protective factors for substance use and media addictive behaviors in adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic

OBJECTIVE

This study examined the long-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on adolescents' substance use, digital media use, and symptoms of internet, gaming, and social media addiction.

METHOD

A nationally representative longitudinal cohort of 1665 Israeli teens and preteens, aged 9-16, completed questionnaires assessing substance use prevalence, daily screen time, symptoms of media addiction, and potential risk and protective factors. Data were collected before the pandemic (October 2019), after the second wave lockdown (November 2020), and after the fifth wave (April 2022) in Israel.

RESULTS

The analysis documented significant increases in substance use, daily screen time, and social media addiction indices over time. Gratitude, life satisfaction, positive emotions, future orientation, grit, and secure attachment emerged as significant protective factors. Sensation-seeking, negative emotions, and mental health symptoms were identified as risk factors.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings highlight the importance of educational and public mental health services in addressing the pandemic's long-term impact on the mental health and addictive behaviors of adolescents. They also emphasize the significance of enhancing protective factors and reducing risk factors to effectively mitigate substance and digital media abuse among adolescents.

Evaluating the effect of action-like video game play and of casual video game play on anxiety in adolescents with elevated anxiety: protocol for a multi-center, parallel group, assessor-blind, randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND

Adolescence is a critical period for the onset and maintenance of anxiety disorders, which raises the importance of intervening early; one possibility of doing so is via digital interventions. Within that research field, at least two important research paths have been explored in the past years. On the one hand, the anxiolytic effect of casual video games has been tested as such gaming activity may distract away from anxious thoughts through the induction of flow and redirection of attention toward the game and thus away of anxious thoughts. On the other hand, the bidirectional link between weak attentional control and higher anxiety has led to the design of interventions aiming at improving attentional control such as working memory training studies. Taking stock that another genre of gaming, action video games, improves attentional control, game-based interventions that combines cognitive training and action-like game features would seem relevant. This three-arm randomized controlled trial aims to evaluate the feasibility and the efficacy of two video game interventions to document how each may potentially alleviate adolescent anxiety-related symptoms when deployed fully on-line.

METHODS

The study aims to recruit 150 individuals, 12 to 14 years of age, with high levels of anxiety as reported by the parents' online form of the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Disorders questionnaire. This trial contrasts a child-friendly, "action-like" video game designed to improve attentional control abilities in a progressive and stepwise manner (Eco-Rescue), a casual puzzle video game selected to act as a positive distraction tool (Bejeweled) and finally a control group with no assigned training intervention to control for possible test-retest effects (No-training). Participants will be assigned randomly to one of the three study arms. They will be assessed for main (anxiety) and secondary outcomes (attentional control, affective working memory) at three time points, before training (T1), one week after the 6-week training (T2) and four months after completing the training (T3).

DISCUSSION

The results will provide evidence for the feasibility and the efficacy of two online video game interventions at improving mental health and emotional well-being in adolescents with high levels of anxiety. This project will contribute unique knowledge to the field, as few studies have examined the effects of video game play in the context of digital mental health interventions for adolescents.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

The trial is registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT05923944, June 20, 2023).

The Relationship Between Cognitive Resource Consumption During Gameplay and Postgame Aggressive Behaviors: Between-Subjects Experiment

Background

The question of how video games can shape aggressive behaviors has been a focus for many researchers. Previous research has focused on how violent video game content leads to postgame aggressive behaviors. However, video games not only convey violence or prosocial content to players but also require cognitive effort from individuals. Since human cognitive resources are limited, consuming more cognitive resources in a game leads to less cognitive resources to suppress aggressive impulses. Therefore, the depletion of cognitive resources from playing video games may also lead to changes in postgame aggressive behaviors.

Objective

This study aimed to examine the relationship between cognitive resources consumed in video games and postgame aggressive behaviors.

Methods

A total of 60 participants (age: mean 20.22; range 18-24 y) were randomly assigned to either the high-load group or the low-load group. Participants from both groups played a video game centered around college life. In the low-load group, participants followed the gameplay instructions to complete it. In the high-load group, participants were given an extra digital memory task to complete while playing the game. Participants in both groups played the video game for about 25 minutes. A maze selection task was then conducted to measure the participants' helping and hurting behaviors.

Results

The independent samples 2-tailed t tests showed that the high-load group had significantly higher hurting scores (mean 3.13, SD 2.47) than the low-load group (mean 1.90, SD 2.12; t58=-2.07, P=.04; Cohen d=-0.535), whereas helping behaviors were not significantly affected (t58=1.52, P=.13; Cohen d=0.393).

Conclusions

As more cognitive resources are consumed in a video game, more hurting behaviors are exhibited after the game. This finding proposes an alternative route by which video games impact aggressive behaviors, adding to previous theories and raising concerns about the popularity of cognitive training games.

Relations between Video Game Engagement and Social Development in Children: The Mediating Role of Executive Function and Age-Related Moderation

The global proliferation of video games, particularly among children, has led to growing concerns about the potential impact on children's social development. Executive function is a cognitive ability that plays a crucial role in children's social development, but a child's age constrains its development. To examine the association between video game engagement and children's social development while considering the mediating role of executive function and the moderating role of age, a questionnaire was distributed to a sample of 431 parents. The results revealed a negative relation between video game engagement and social development in children, with executive function found to mediate this relation fully. Additionally, the negative association between video game engagement and executive function became more pronounced as children grew older. In light of these findings, it is advisable to adopt proactive strategies to limit excessive video game use, consider the developmental characteristics of children at different ages, and prioritize the promotion of executive function to facilitate social development among children.

Popularity of Video Games and Collective Memory

Describing the permanence of cultural objects is an important step in understanding societal trends. A relatively novel cultural object is the video game, which is an interactive media, that is, the player is an active contributor to the overall experience. This article aims to investigate video game permanence in collective memory using their popularity as a proxy, employing data based on the Steam platform from July 2012 to December 2020. The objectives include characterizing the database; studying the growth of players, games, and game categories; providing a model for the relative popularity distribution; and applying this model in three strata, global, major categories, and among categories. We detected linear growth trends in the number of players and the number of categories, and an exponential trend in the number of games released. Furthermore, we verified that lognormal distributions, emerging from multiplicative processes, provide a first approximation for the popularity in all strata. In addition, we proposed an improvement via Box–Cox transformations with similar parameters (from −0.12 (95% CI: −0.18, −0.07) to −0.04 (95% CI: −0.08, 0)). We were able to justify this improved model by interpreting the magnitude of each Box–Cox parameter as a measure of memory effects.

Attachment and the Development of Prosocial Behavior in Children and Adolescents: A Systematic Review

(1) Background: One key assumption of attachment theory is the relationship between security and the development of prosocial behavior. A secure child is more likely to feel and show concern for another individual, resulting in higher levels of prosocial behaviors (defined as voluntary behavior intended to benefit others—e.g., helping, sharing, comforting). (2) Method: Using a systematic review of the literature (PROSPERO: CRD42022290706), 703 articles were identified (EBSCO databases), from which 16 were considered eligible by the first two authors (inter-reviewer agreement: 85.714%). The criteria for an article’s exclusion were as follows: samples of children/teens not living in natural contexts; studies on psychopathologies; intervention programs; qualitative designs; studies on development or the validation of measures; studies that did not reliably measure the variables studied. (3) Results and Discussion: The eligible studies revealed incongruous results about the potential associations between attachment security to mothers and fathers and prosocial behavior. More consistent and significant relationships were found between the quality of attachment and empathy, while the associations between attachment and prosocial behavior were inconsistent (e.g., nine articles revealed significant associations; seven did not). In six studies, empathy was revealed to play an important role as the mediator between attachment security and prosocial behavior. The limitations and future recommendations were discussed.

Analysis of the coexistence of gaming and viewing activities in Twitch users and their relationship with pathological gaming: a multilayer perceptron approach

The enormous expansion of the video game sector, driven by the emergence of live video game streaming platforms and the professionalisation of this hobby through e-sports, has spurred interest in research on the relationships with potential adverse effects derived from cumulative use. This study explores the co-occurrence of the consumption and viewing of video games, based on an analysis of the motivations for using these services, the perceived positive uses, and the gamer profile. To that end, a multilayer perceptron artificial neural network is developed and tested on a sample of 970 video game users. The results show that the variables with a significant influence on pathological gaming are the motivation of a sense of belonging to the different platforms, as well as the positive uses relating to making friends and the possibility of making this hobby a profession. Furthermore, the individual effects of each of the variables have been estimated. The results indicate that the social component linked to the positive perception of making new friends and the self-perceived level as a gamer have been identified as possible predictors, when it comes to a clinical assessment of the adverse effects. Conversely, the variables age and following specific streamers are found to play a role in reducing potential negative effects.

A hypothetic model for examining the relationship between happiness, forgiveness, emotional reactivity and emotional security

The ultimate goal of life is happiness, according to Plato. Perhaps the most critical questions in the life of human beings have been on happiness and processes that affect happiness. The present study was planned during the COVID-19 pandemic; perhaps human beings are most needed for happiness. The original hypothetical model and the findings constitute the powerful and different aspects of the present study. This study determined a hypothetical model to examine the relationships among happiness, forgiveness, emotional reactivity, and emotional security. The participant group of the study consists of a total of 916 individuals from Turkey, 617 women, and 299 men. The age scale of the participants is between 18-25. Participants completed the Heartland Forgiveness Scale, the Emotional Security Scale, the Emotional Reactivity Scale, and the Oxford Happiness Scale. Mediation analysis was conducted using Hayes' (2017) process macro. According to the proposed model in the study, emotional reactivity mediates the relationship between forgiveness and happiness. As the individual's forgiveness increases, their emotional reactivity decreases, and as the emotional reactivity decreases, the individual's level of happiness increases.

Feelings of Loneliness: Understanding the Risk of Suicidal Ideation in Adolescents with Internet Addiction. A Theoretical Model to Answer to a Systematic Literature Review, without Results

The Internet has become an essential tool for adolescents. It is part of their social integration within peers and supports their identity construction. The Internet can also become a source of addiction, especially when used as a coping strategy towards unpleasant life situations. Addiction to the Internet is often linked with an increase in the feeling of loneliness. The feeling of loneliness is an emotion present during adolescence. However, in excess, it can lead to suicidal ideation. Addiction to the Internet is also linked to an increased suicide risk. We questioned ourselves on the impact of the feeling of loneliness on the link between an excessive use of the Internet by adolescents and the risks of suicidal ideation. We attempted to find an answer to this question by performing a systematic review of the literature. We found no result matching our search criteria. We noted the absence of studies with regards to the interaction between the feeling of loneliness, addiction to the Internet and the risk of suicidal ideation amongst adolescents. We established a theoretical model which could be used as a lead for future research. We insist on the importance that studies need to be conducted in this domain, in order to enable us to establish efficient preventive measures for the risks of suicidal ideation amongst adolescents.

So your patient is a gamer: an exploration of benefits and harms

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

The appropriate amount and type of screen time for children remains a persistent topic of discussion between parents and pediatricians. During the COVID-19 pandemic, screen time has considerably increased. The need to quarantine and utilize remote learning prompted our review of the basis for current screen time recommendations and more recent research.

RECENT FINDINGS

The broad stroke of recent research points to an association of increased video game screen time with sedentary lifestyle and its related harms. However, there also are specific instances where video games have been found to be therapeutically useful for certain populations.

SUMMARY

In light of these findings, it is prudent for the pediatrician to explore more of the 'why' of video game use as opposed to purely the 'how much'. Given the future beneficial therapeutic uses of some video games, clinicians should keep their eyes on this space for its continued development.