How can long hours of gaming affect your health?

Gaming is no longer a hobby that you spend hours in a dark room. With the increasing popularity of video games, there is gaming competition held in stadiums. The first even gaming competition was held in 1980 with over 10,000 participants. In 2017, the biggest ever gaming competition with 173,000 fans was held in Poland.

The gaming industry has been rise with more people playing games. Whether we are looking for recreation or spending some fun time with friends, gaming has become an essential part.

Every day after coming back from work, you put your gaming glasses on getting into esports, or you are tapping on your phone while commuting back and forth from work. It’s not just kids who play games. In fact, there is only 21 per cent of gamers under the age of 18. It’s mostly adults who play games a lot.

Why is gaming addictive?

It’s interesting how you end up hours in front of your gaming screen before even knowing it. You will think you would play for ten more minutes and that those ten minutes end up becoming an hour or even more.

Games are designed in a way that you continue to play. You play the first level and succeed in doing so. You play another level, you end up winning again. This continuous cycle of winning releases dopamine in your brain. Dopamine is a feel good chemical in your brain. You feel good about winning and continue doing so.

When you encounter a tougher game but equally intriguing, you are even more likely to play the game. You have a good time playing games, and you continue to play again and again.

Can you sustain injuries while gaming?

Not as life threatening as when you are riding an actual bike on the road versus road rashing on screen. But you do suffer from some injuries if you have been playing games on devices for a very long time. You have an increased risk of getting gamers thumb. It is a condition when your thumb becomes numb, and it is difficult to move it.

Carpal tunnel syndrome is another condition that a lot of computer users suffer from. In this, you hurt the nerves in your hands which makes it excruciatingly painful. Not just gamers, artists, graphic designers, writers and programmers suffer from this condition.

Effects of Gaming on Health

Sitting for long hours in front of a screen can affect your health. The most common outcome of gaming for hours is a headache. You start having eye strain, dry eyes, blurry vision after your long gaming session.

The computer screen emits blue light, which disrupts your sleeping cycle. You end up playing for longer hours than intended. You are sleep deprived most of the time. Also, you find it harder to fall asleep.

Glasses that can block blue light help to a certain extent. By blocking most of the blue lights, you are protecting your eyes from the excess glare. You do not strain your eyes as much as you do without glasses.

Sitting for long hours have other adverse health issues like obesity. As you tend to sit for hours with little to no exercise. You also binge eat along with gaming which is very unhealthy. You are also at an increased risk of stroke.

You also start having back pain, neck pain because of sitting for hours in the same position.

Effects of gaming on mental health

Spending long hours inside a room without sun can make you depressed. Sunlight makes you feel invigorated. With the absence of light and lack of movement, you feel down. You also become a lot aggressive. It also increases anxiety.

Most people play games to escape reality and immerse themselves in the game world devoid of real-life problems. This pleasure of escapism is addictive and makes you more anxious as your actual problems are not solved. You just avoided them.

Many violent games desensitize teens and young adults by downplaying the intensity of those violent games. Games like GTA are very addictive. You are rewarded more for doing quite questionable actions. You shove it back of your mind as it is just a game. For young kids, this impacts their moral reasoning.

Another adverse effect of gaming is withdrawal. When you spend a lot of time playing with your online friends, you barely go out and make real friends outside. You withdraw from society and lose interest in activities other than games.

In Japan, this kind of reclusive individual is called hikikomori. The meaning of hikikomori is to live in isolation. There are a lot of young adults and teens going into this state of isolation.

In Japan alone, the number of hikikomori is over 10 million.

In a nutshell, long hours of gaming can lead to a lot of mental health issues like -

1. Depression
2. Aggression
3. Anxiety
4. Social Withdrawal
5. Loss of interest in other things
6. Loss of education and career opportunities
7. Failure to control self

Benefits of gaming

Gaming has adverse side effects, but we cannot downplay the benefits of gaming too. Gaming is an excellent tool of communication. No matter what country, religion or race, you can get along with anyone as long as you share the same interests. The virtual community helps you meet with people from all over the globe.

Also, it bridges the gap between generations. Young kids play with their parents or grandparents. Children with autism are more able to communicate and express themselves with these games. It also helps in training people with degenerative diseases to improve balance. Gaming helps kids with ADHD by improving their thinking skills.

With visual simulations, training doctors, pilots are even possible. Surely, gaming has a lot of benefits as well. Only if we game in moderation, we can enjoy the games as they are meant to be.