Video game characteristics, happiness and flow as predictors of addiction among video game players: A pilot study

Abstract

Aims: Video games provide opportunities for positive psychological experiences such as flow-like phenomena during play and general happiness that could be associated with gaming achievements. However, research has shown that specific features of game play may be associated with problematic behaviour associated with addiction-like experiences. The study was aimed at analysing whether certain structural characteristics of video games, flow, and global happiness could be predictive of video game addiction. Method: A total of 110 video game players were surveyed about a game they had recently played by using a 24-item checklist of structural characteristics, an adapted Flow State Scale, the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire, and the Game Addiction Scale. Results: The study revealed decreases in general happiness had the strongest role in predicting increases in gaming addiction. One of the nine factors of the flow experience was a significant predictor of gaming addiction – perceptions of time being altered during play. The structural characteristic that significantly predicted addiction was its social element with increased sociability being associated with higher levels of addictive-like experiences. Overall, the structural characteristics of video games, elements of the flow experience, and general happiness accounted for 49.2% of the total variance in Game Addiction Scale levels. Conclusions: Implications for interventions are discussed, particularly with regard to making players more aware of time passing and in capitalising on benefits of social features of video game play to guard against addictive-like tendencies among video game players.

MMORPG gaming and hostility predict Internet Addiction symptoms in adolescents: An empirical multilevel longitudinal study

“…While MMORPGs have been consistently associated with IA (Kuss & Griffiths, 2012;Gentile et al, 2011), their likely positive effects in the areas of social interactions and facilitating educational learning have also been noted (Cole & Griffiths, 2007;De Freitas & Griffiths, 2011;Skoric & Kwan, 2011;Jones, Scholes, Johnson, Katsikitis, & Carras, 2014). Continuously increasing challenges, scoring, and immediate gratification in MMORPGs enable players to achieve a sense of self-actualization (Wan & Chiou, 2006), and this has been linked to IA (Hull, Williams & Griffiths, 2013).…”

“…This association can be explained by online satisfaction and immediate gratification due to addressing the gradually increasing level of challenges in MMORPGs (Choi & Kim, 2004;Hull et al, 2013;Wan & Chiou, 2006). More specifically, MMORPGs may trigger high emotional involvement and an increased need to spending time online (Gentile et al, 2011), and thus reinforcing IA.…”

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“…En relación a esto, los individuos que durante la experiencia de juego presentan una alteración de la conciencia temporal, están en riesgo de seguir jugando por un tiempo significativamente más largo, lo que también facilita el desarrollo de la adicción (Hull, Williams & Griffiths, 2013). Este estudio incluso advierte de la importancia de entrenar a los pacientes sobre la posibilidad de una mejor compresión sobre el tiempo dedicado al juego electrónico.…”

A brief update on videogame play and flow experience: From addiction to healthy gaming

“…Regardless of existing debates, research has paid little attention to the role of flow experiences in videogame play, an area that still needs further investigation [29].…”

“…However, the study conducted by Wan and Chiou [36] found flow experiences to be negatively associated with addictive inclination towards videogames, which led the authors to assert that flow experiences may not be the key psychological mechanism underlying videogame addiction. Online game flow has also been found to be a mediating factor between game motivations and videogame addiction [37], and a relatively recent study on videogame addiction and flow found that a particular factor of the flow experience (i.e., heightened levels of a sense of time being altered during play) significantly predicted videogame addiction [29].…”