Podcast Journal Response

In the podcast for my webtext, I am going to discuss causes, symptoms, and how to deal with video game addiction.  I chose this to accompany my topic of how gaming affects the players' social interactions because an addiction to gaming can have a severely negative effect on a gamer's social life.  This is a topic that is of importance not only to gamers, but to anyone who is friends, family, or close in any way to a gamer in their life, to help ensure that they are not falling victim to addiction.

Gamers who are under the grasp of gaming addiction will likely experience at least a few of the following symptoms:

• Salience, when gaming becomes, apparently, the singular most important thing to them (Griffiths, 2005, p. 193).  
• Drastic changes to their mood when separated from their games.
• Absurdly long periods of them gaming without them noticing how much time has passed.  
• A higher sense of introversion.  
• Multiple instances of the player's gaming coming into conflict with their other, more important activities such as schoolwork or their jobs
• Immediate returns to gaming after being cut off from it (Griffiths, 2010, p. 491)

There is not much I could find on the causes of gaming addiction, but I can say from previous research and personal experience that many gamers use their activities as an escape from the harsher realities of their lives.  For example, some may resort to violent gaming as an outlet for their frustrations with an unsatisfactory family relationship (Coyne, 2012).  Addiction can occur from an overuse and dependency that arises out of this kind of situation.

As with most types of addiction, intervention--particularly, family-based interventions--can be an effective method of pulling an addicted gamer out of their habits.  A particular effective method can be adapted from a study on family-based interventions performed with internet-addicted adolescents, due to how similar these types of addiction are (Li, 2011, p. 1021).  The intervention with the gamer should be "half-structural"--that is, partly planned ahead, partly ad-libbed to adapt to the situation as the group conversation goes along--that focuses on a few certain goals:

• "Promoting a supportive environment"
• Studying proper use and perception of gaming as an activity
• Helping the gamer to be more self-aware and self-confident
• Promotion of a functional family
• "Fostering hope for future recovery"

This topic lends itself well to a podcast format as it is something I feel I can actually put some real feeling into with my voice better than I would be able to do via merely text.

Summary/Response(?): Bowling Alone

Putnam, R.D. (2000).  Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community.  New York, NY.

Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone (2000) is an informative piece on how innovations in the lives of Americans has led to an increasing disconnect among the general community of the country.  For example, how things such as the mass media through television, the shifting general migration into suburban areas, and improvements to transportation methods have unset many of the common community values in Americans.  I have not had time to read over the whole book as of yet to get an extremely concise summary, but I felt this one suitable to check out, as this work is referenced in much of the literature I have examined as of yet for its  use of "social capital" as a concept.

From a brief skimming of the book, Putnam does use a rather down-to-earth tone in his writing, but he still sounds properly authoritative all the same.  His use of statistics throughout the book to prove his points enhances his credibility.  The book is recent enough that it mentions video games in passing--this may be a bit of a hindrance in itself, as only a couple of lines in the text are devoted to that subject, but the overall subject matter of the book is an important one to consider in the context nonetheless.

Summary/Response: The social side of gaming

Trepte, S., Reineck, L., & Juechems, K. (May 2012).  The social side of gaming: How playing online computer games creates online and offline social support.  Computers in Human Behavior, 28, 832-839.  Retrieved from http://lib-proxy.purduecal.edu:2092/science/article/pii/S0747563211002706

Trepte, Reineck & Juechems (2012) performed analysis of the correlations between factors of building social capital as they apply to online gaming contexts and the strengthening of offline social support.  Their research is built off of that of multiple others in the field who have researched online gaming's influence on the social lives of gamers.  They take into account the factors of physical proximity, social proximity (i.e. "how close people are in terms of mutual availability and accessibility") and familiarity ("frequency of interpersonal exposure"), and analyze statistical data collected from hundreds of gamers who participate in e-sports "clans" (groups of gamers who frequently work together toward accomplishing tasks) to find correlations between these factors and the strength of their offline social support.

I am, as of yet, not entirely sure what to think of their findings.  While they did, through path analysis of their Linkert-type-scale data collection, prove each of their hypotheses true regarding positive (and one negative) links among the factors of online social capital and offline socialization, it is still a bit of a stretch to fully trust purely statistical analysis on so personal a matter as friendship and social bonds.  As a bit of relief, however, they do in fact recognize this limitation on their studies: "To increase the reliability and validity of the measures, items referring to overt patterns of behavior. . .or observable forms of social interaction within the clan. . .rather than subjective feelings. . .were applied.  We believe that these behavior-based items provide reliable and valid measures of the respective constructs. At the same time, however, the breadth of the used indicators is limited: involvement in clan administration, for example, is by no means the only indicator of social proximity."  To this end they recommend, for further research, replication of this study with "additional
empirical indicators of these theoretical constructs".

However, considering my lack of experience with the path analysis method, I certainly must do further studying on the concept and process of this kind of analysis before I make overt judgments on the validity of their findings.  As it lies now, however, I find this study to be, for the most part, rather credible.  For one point, its very nature of being a peer-reviewed journal article gives it plenty of reliability.  However, I did catch a couple of typos that made this stance a slight bit uneasy (". . .a significant statistical relationship between theses three variables. . ." & "These results have practical implications that could proof beneficial. . .")  As far as accuracy is concerned, from the studies I have already read which they referenced, I believe they used their sources quite accurately and efficiently, though there was one particular spot (near the beginning of p.385) where they use a quote from Steinkuehler & Williams that--at least for me, as a reader--somewhat out-of-place, or even contradictory to the point they are trying to make in that section.  Though perhaps that may be nothing more than a reading comprehension failure on my part.  The article is as-of-now quite current, being published in its journal just last year (2012), and the majority of its sources are from post-2000.  I believe the article is also quite objective enough, as it does present multiple differing viewpoints from other studies done on this subject, and its analysis is through pure data pathing.

Lit review notes.

Gotta note down potentially important things in my sources.




Chen, M.-Y., Chen, Y.-J., Li, Y.-J. & Teng, C.-I. (2012) Loyalty Due to Others: The Relationships Among Challenge, Interdependence, and Online Gamer
Loyalty. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 17: 489–500. Retrieved from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2012.01586.x/full

• "Previous studies have established that online gamers favor online social activities" -- what previous studies?
• "gaming challenge is positively related to interdependence"
• "Interdependence" : " i.e. the extent to which online gamers help each other achieve common goals"
•  "Uniquely, this study examines whether challenges in cyberspace, i.e. the online gaming world, increase interdependence. Such an examination is owing to that teams, i.e. a group of interdependent players, can overcome challenges that may be too difficult for individuals in online gaming environments, thus motivating gamers to rely on each other."
• "Interdependence theory (Rusbult, 1980) posits that an individual tendency to minimize costs and maximize returns facilitates the formation of partnerships and encourages cooperation. During online gaming, challenges require that gamers exert both time and energy (i.e. gamer costs) to obtain gaming achievements (i.e. gamer returns), thus motivating gamers to form teams or partnerships to reduce time and energy expended, thus increasing gamer interdependence. Restated, challenges encourage gamers to depend on each other in order to acquire attractive returns or gain achievements while minimizing costs. Challenge is thus likely associated with interdependence. Therefore, we hypothesize the following:--H1: Challenge is positively related to interdependence."
• "Bilateral deterrence theory (Kumar, Scheer, & Steenkamp, 1995) posits that interdependence among individuals increases trust and commitment. Also, interdependence may predict gamer loyalty since trust and commitment are associated with loyalty. The application of bilateral deterrence theory to online gaming contexts reveals that gamer interdependence enhances gamer trust and commitment to a team. Because the intention to remain within an organization or group is positively related to member trust (Tourangeau et al., 2010) and commitment to a team or organization (Jourdain & Chênevert, 2010), gamer interdependence is likely related to strong intention in order to repeatedly play a specific game, i.e. the essence of loyalty (Zeithaml, Berry, & Parasuraman, 1996)."  -- While this is meant to feed directly into the concept of gamer loyalty to the game, these ideas can also be examined in the context of gamers developing further relationships with one another, both within--and perhaps eventually--outside the game.
• "The theory of achievement motivation (Atkinson, 1958; McClelland, 1985) asserts that an inverse curvilinear relationship exists between task difficulty and individual effort. Exerted effort is maximum when task difficulty is moderate. Related studies have found that individual effort decreases only when an ability limit (the maximum extent one can achieve) is reached (Erez & Zidon, 1984). Specifically, difficulty and individual effort have a positive linear relationship within ability limit (Locke & Latham, 2002). Applying this theory to the gaming context indicates that game designers likely design difficulty levels so that they are perceived as within the ability limits of gamers when playing alone or in teams. Therefore, gaming difficulty should have a linear relationship, not a curvilinear one, with gamer effort or motivation."  -- This may not necessarily be used in the paper, but I personally actually find this idea very interesting, not to mention accurate.
• "Online gamers were recruited to participate in this study via invitations posted on over 20 forums that gamers visit frequently. Respondents were solicited from multiple sources to minimize biases associated with a single sample source. The invitations stated the study objective as examining online gamer psychology and behavior. Responses were collected during November 2008 by using a web form. Study participants were eligible for a lottery that awarded US$15 gift certificates to 50 winners. As a common practice of local online surveys, a lottery generates minimal self-selection bias. To increase the generalizability of study findings, limits were not imposed on genres or types of games that respondents played. Responses that named a nonexistent game or had incomplete answers were excluded. Totally 1,013 online gamers provided 994 usable responses."
• "An attempt was made to further determine whether certain variables influence findings by adding three control variables. First, the number of months that the study participants played online games was considered, since a long gaming history may generate individual habits, subsequently fueling gamer loyalty. Second, the number of hours spent gaming weekly was considered, since a large number of hours may reflect gamer enthusiasm for gaming, ultimately promoting gamer loyalty. Three items measuring flow (Novak et al., 2000) were also assessed. Because flow was not the main study construct, the three items were averaged to provide a score that was then used as the control variable. The paths from challenge to flow and from flow to loyalty were added in order to reflect the consensus in flow studies.  When control variables were added to the proposed model, path coefficients changed only slightly. The path coefficient from challenge to interdependence increased from .38 to .39, and the path coefficient from challenge to loyalty decreased from .60 to .58. However, both coefficients remained large. The path coefficient from interdependence to loyalty declined from .09 to .05, while still markedly exceeding zero (p < .05). The significance of all path coefficients suggests that study findings were robust, even when considering control variables." --Summed up, even when variables such as varied gaming histories and varied hours played in a week were accounted for, the results proving a link between gaming challenge and interdependence did not significantly vary.
• "Theoretically, this study significantly contributes to online gaming literature by applying an interpersonal perspective to examine predictors of online gamer loyalty. Most online gaming studies focus on the gaming experience of a single online gamer."
• This study enrolled gamers to increase the generalizability of findings. However, enrolling players of various games precluded an investigation of the unique characteristics of single games. Moreover, the lack of a limit on genres or types of games may explain the relatively small indirect effect of challenge on loyalty via interdependence. Games may differ markedly to the extent to which they encourage interdependence, thus diluting this indirect effect."

Steinkuehler, C. A. and Williams, D. (2006), Where Everybody Knows Your (Screen) Online Games as “Third Places”. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 11: 885–909.  Retrieved from http://people.cs.pitt.edu/~rosta/SocialWeb/Steinkuehler2006.pdf

• Linked in the previous article, regarding gamers providing emotional support for one another
• ". . .we present a shared theoretical framework for understanding. . .the extent to which. . .virtual worlds are structurally similar to “third places” (Oldenburg, 1999)"
• "Third Places"  :http://www.mnsu.edu/voices/greatgoodplace.pdf
• "Participation in such virtual ‘‘third places’’ appears particularly well suited to the formation of bridging social capital—social relationships that, while not usually providing deep emotional support, typically function to expose the individual to a diversity of worldviews"
• Go to library, rent "Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community"
• POSSIBILITY:  MAKE CONNECTIONS TO D&D AND ITS DEPICTION IN SOCIETY.  "Technically, they are the latest step in a progression of social games that originated with paper-and-pencil fantasy games (e.g., Dungeons and Dragons, Gygax & Arneson, 1973) and later migrated to computers, first as mainframe text-based multi-user dungeons (MUDs) (Trubshaw & Bartle, 1978) and later as the high-end 3-D digital worlds of today (Koster, 2002)."
• "The virtual worlds that today’s MMO players routinely plug in and inhabit are persistent social and material worlds, loosely structured by open-ended narratives, where players are largely free to do as they please, to slay ogres, siege castles, etc. They are known for their peculiar combination of designed ‘‘escapist fantasy’’ and emergent ‘‘social realism’’ (Kolbert, 2001): In a setting of wizards and elves, dwarfs and knights, people save for homes, create basket indices of the trading market, build relationships of status and solidarity, and worry about crime." -- Gaming worlds have visible parallels to reality
• "The first project was a traditional effects study of MMOs focused on issues of social capital and displacement that examined questions raised by Putnam, Nie, Wellman, and others that sought to discover whether the MMOs Asheron’s Call I and II added to or subtracted from players‘ overall social capital. The methods used were a combination of survey research and experimental design, with first-time MMO players given a free copy of the game or placed in a control group that did not play the game (Williams, in press). Seven hundred and fifty participants populated the two groups. The changes among the treatment group players were contrasted between the two groups and presented statistically to demonstrate the ‘‘effects’’ of game play vs. no game play."
• "This statistical evidence was buttressed by a complementary participant observation phase during which the investigator played the game and conducted 30 random interviews with other players over a period of one year. In semi-structured interviews, players were asked about their motivations for playing, their in-game social networks, and about their life outside the game. The investigator sampled players in central city locations and in remote wilderness areas across all of the games’ experience levels and kept field notes to inform the subsequent survey and experimental work. Unlike the survey data, these interviews were not intended to be representative, but rather to discover trends and norms that could be compared and contrasted with the quantitative data and that could help fashion appropriate survey questions. Nevertheless, these observations squared with the survey results and with the results of the second project detailed below."
• "In online worlds, interaction is mediated by the virtual avatars of the individuals who inhabit them. These avatars bear no discernable relationship to one’s offline identity, unless one choosesto render one’s own characterso identifiable, for example, by using one’s given name instead of a pseudonym (a rare practice) or sharing personal information about one’s offline personae with others within the game. This anonymity provides a safe haven beyond the reach of work and home that allows individuals to engage with others socially without entangling obligations and repercussions; it is the so-called ‘‘magic circle’’ of the game (Huizinga, 1949). The question of ‘‘entangling obligation,’’ therefore, is principally relevant only to the extent that the real life personas are actually known by the other participants. According to Yee (2006), such cases are fairly common: 25% of players game with a romantic partner and 19% with a family member. One might conclude, then, that entangling  bligations reemerge within such contexts and the function of MMOs as third places is thwarted. However, Yee’s (2006) interviews also reveal that individuals who game with romantic partners orfamily find thatsuch joint engagement in the ‘‘other world’’ of MMOs allows them to redefine the nature and boundaries of their offline relationships, often in more equitable terms than what may be possible in day-to-day offline life.  For example, in regard to gaming with her daughter, one interviewee remarks,
  I think it has enhanced our relationship, we both treat each other more like equals and partners in our private life. It is much easier to talk to her now and I have found her talking to me about much more of her life and ideas. (Yee, 2006)
  Thus, in cases in which real life identities are known, it seems that the relationships that play-partners have with one another offline are often ‘‘leveled’’ within the online world.

Coyne, S.M., Fraser,  A.M., Nelson, L.J., Padilla-Walker, L.M. & Stockdale, L.A. (2012) Associations Between Violent Video Gaming, Empathic Concern,        and Prosocial Behavior Toward Strangers, Friends, and Family Members.  Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 41, 636-649.  Retrieved from http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10964-012-9742-2/fulltext.html

• "recent estimations have shown that over 90% of America’s children and adolescents own a video gaming system and over 60% play video games for at least 30 min a day, although this effect is moderated by gender in that boys play for about an hour per day, while girls play for under 15 min per day" -- see if this assumption is contested in other sources?
• "Although the study of violent video gaming has been primarily focused on younger age groups, frequency of video gaming increases around age 18 (Anand 2007), and peaks in the twenties (ESA 2011)."
• "Video games represent a socializing agent during this formative period, with the potential to influence many developmental domains, including self-perception, aggression, relationship quality, risk-taking, and gender stereotyping (Behm-Morawitz and Mastro 2009; Padilla-Walker et al. 2010)."
• "Although findings are mixed on outcomes of violent video gaming, there have been a number of studies examining various associations. For example, a pattern of violent video gaming was associated with decreased SAT scores (Anand 2007) and greater drug use, drinking behavior, and number of sexual partners, along with lower relationship quality, self-worth, and perceived social acceptance in emerging adulthood (Padilla-Walker et al.2010). The most recent meta-analysis on violent video gaming revealed that exposure led to increases, although small, in aggressive behavior, cognition, and affect, while decreasing prosocial behavior and empathy (Anderson et al. 2010). However, as with most controversial issues in the social science field, there is another side to the debate on the effects of video game violence. Indeed, some researchers postulate that the concern over violent video gaming is just the latest topic for “moral crusaders” to facilitate a panic over (Cumberbatch 2008; Ferguson2010). This claim is not unfounded, as a growing body of research shows that violent video gaming is, in fact, not linked to increased aggression (Baldaro et al. 2004; Ferguson et al. 2009; Williams and Skoric 2005), is linked to reductions in aggression (Barnett et al. 2008), or has links to increased aggression that are too minimal to be considered influential (Sherry 2001). Indeed, these findings show that not all associations are negative and violent video gaming may even be related to positive outcomes."
• "Desensitization theory speculates that repeated exposure to violence in the media can lead to an attitude of “numbness” toward real-life violence, which is based upon the assumption that humans have innately negative physiological and psychological reactions to observed violence. Rule and Ferguson (1986) then point out that desensitization is the habituation or attenuation of distressing reactivity to observed violence due to exposure to violence either in real-life or in the media. . .Relevant to the current study, in the short term, exposure to violent video gaming may influence a person’s internal state, perhaps by dulling affect and diminishing arousal for habitual players. This altered state may then influence behavior in subsequent situations, perhaps inhibiting the appraisal and decision making process leading to inactivity and general apathy concerning others in need. In the long term, the GAM (General Aggression Model; Bushman and Anderson 2009) suggests that repeated exposure to violent video games can shape an individual’s personality regarding aggressive behavior (and on the flip side, prosocial behavior), by shaping cognitive scripts regarding aggression, leading the individual to habitually become less concerned with the violence around them."
• "Given the importance of prosocial behavior, desensitization to violence as a result of repeated exposure to violent video games is important to consider because it could influence a person’s willingness to respond to others in need (Funk 2005). Researchers have shown that violent video gaming was significantly related to lower levels of prosocial behavior across multiple studies (Anderson et al. 2010). In one study (Bushman and Anderson 2009), after playing violent video games in a laboratory setting, a fake fight was staged outside the lab door. Those who played a violent game took over 450% longer to help the stranger, were less likely to even notice the fight occurred, and rated the fight as less serious. These findings again show that repeated violent video gaming may have negative consequences among an emerging adulthood population, possibly reducing prosocial behavior."
• LOTS OF STUFF.
• The gist of it is, within their sample, they confirmed negative correlation between violent video gaming and both empathic concern & prosocial behavior, with the results most pointedly showing lowered empathy toward strangers.  There were also links between violent gaming and lowered empathy with family members, though due to the nature of the study it is not entirely possible to rule out the notion that violent gaming could be fueled by a bad family relationship rather than being a cause of it.  They also posit that while links were found between lowering of those characteristics and frequent violent gaming, other types of video games (i.e., non-violent or prosocial games) could in fact have positive effect on those qualities.

Hawkins, B.P. & Hertlein, K.M. (2012) Online Gaming Issues in Offline Couple Relationships: A Primer for Marriage and Family Therapists.  The Qualitative Report.  17: 1-48.  Retrieved from http://www.nova.edu/ssss/QR/QR17/hertlein.pdf

• "Although it is generally believed that  household gamers are primarily children and adolescents, ESA (2009) found the average  age of the American gamer is 35 (while the average age for the video game purchaser is  39) and had been gaming for 12 years (ESA, 2009). Online gaming also cuts across a  wide variety of demographic groups. Women are the fastest growing demographic in the  gaming world with 40% of them currently playing games. An estimated 25% of seniors also game, representing a nine percent increase over the last decade (ESA, 2009)."

The Dynamics of Family Interaction 

Around Home Video Games 

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1300/J002v08n01_10