Project to reassess gaming disorder receives €2m in funding

Starting from 2022, videogame play is a part of the World Health Organization’s diagnostic manual as an addictive behaviour. However, many researchers believe that inventing a gaming-specific mental disorder was merely a quick fix for more complicated scientific questions that technologies have come to pose.
Published
21.1.2022

The European Research Council has awarded Veli-Matti Karhulahti with €2m for a project that will investigate intensive gaming habits and health problems that may occur along with them. The multinational project uses longitudinal qualitative methods in South Korea, Slovakia, and Finland. Additionally, resources are distributed to other countries for replicating findings across cultures.

“This project should’ve been done 20 years ago” says Karhulahti. “Instead of trying to understand those who consider gaming as problematic for them, researchers jumped directly to using surveys that may have nothing to do with the actual problems.”

Alongside human research, the project will analyze the design structures of videogames that are played. The goal is to connect the participants’ experiences to specific design components and build a taxonomic understanding of how different types of intensive play manifest.

“Not all problems are diseases or mental disorders,” explains Karhulahti. “We need a more diverse system for addressing the relationships that people have with technology. That’s the system we’re aiming to build.”

The project does not focus on problems alone but also on gaming that is supportive of people’s health. Some of the participants will be active players of esports games. The fact that gaming can be both problematic and supportive for health has been polarizing research for a long time.

“Many of the debates in the field derive from a lack of research transparency,” says Karhulahti. “This project pursues best practices in all areas and further develops the Registered Report approach, where external experts evaluate plans before they are carried out.”

Karhulahti works in the core field of game research at the Department of Music, Art and Culture Studies. Ontological Reconstruction of Gaming Disorder (ORE) is a five-year project that will start in the spring.

Further information:

Veli-Matti Karhulahti, 0505336559, veli-matti.m.karhulahti@jyu.fi