‘Gaming disorder’ will soon be classified as a mental health condition

If you think your friend’s addiction to Fortnite is negatively affecting their health, you may not be wrong.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is set to classify ‘gaming addiction’ as a mental health condition.

Gaming disorder is characterized by a pattern of persistent behaviour surrounding video games, which includes the following:

1. Impaired control over gaming (e.g., onset, frequency, intensity, duration, termination, context).
2. Increasing priority given to gaming to the extent that gaming takes precedence over other life interests and daily activities.
3. Continuation or escalation of gaming despite the occurrence of negative consequences.

Those behaviours, according to the WHO, can significantly impair people’s personal, family, social, educational, occupational and other important areas of functioning.

The move to classify gaming addiction as a mental health condition will allow better treatment for those who are affected by video games in this way.

This makes perfect sense. And important today with the current climate of the video game industry where micro transactions and pay for perks are becoming the norm in mainstream gaming. Very similar affect to the slot machine reward system that triggers addiction. https://t.co/FzHclqmzVA

— Brandt Brickell (@brandt_brickell) June 18, 2018

“The pattern of gaming behaviour may be continuous or episodic and recurrent,” reads the WHO’s classification of gaming disorder.

“The gaming behaviour and other features are normally evident over a period of at least 12 months in order for a diagnosis to be assigned, although the required duration may be shortened if all diagnostic requirements are met and symptoms are severe.”

A 2015 Ontario Student Drug Use and Mental Health Survey showed that 13% of students between grades seven and 12 reported symptoms of a problem with video games.