You may or may not buy into the idea that game addiction exists, but doctors at southern Italy's Lecce Hospital (note to self: don't get sick in Lecce) recently diagnosed a 13-year-old boy with "PlayStation addiction."
Then again, the news is coming through the filter of a politician. As reported by Ananova:
At first doctors... thought Lorenzo Amato was suffering from a stroke or a severe brain disorder.
The teenager couldn't speak and didn't seem to understand anything going on around him. Then doctors discovered he'd just finished a marathon session on his new Playstation.
Local politician Antonio Buccoliero, who spoke to the doctors, said: "They eventually managed to take care of him once they understood that this was a strange kind of mental detachment connected to his Playstation."
The boy supposedly told his father to get rid of the PlayStation, saying, "If I even think about it I want to throw up."
Comments
Sounds like the kid got addicted and then brainwashed.
--- Official Protector of Videoland!
Marathon and addiction are not the same thing, but even exhaustion by stupidity of not sleeping and eating right, then brainwashed would still be true. Watch out, Scientology may pick up this method of brainwashing, haha.
Oh boy... This is like the Pentecostal church giving people a sensory overload then brainwash them to think it was because they received the Holy Ghost. Except this kid did it to himself, and his parents didn't pull him away at all.
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Yeah, i'd been following this for a while before GP posted it, but decided not to bother bringing it to light. I dont know if it even happened. Every report i find about this incident changes, yet each claims to have spoken to the doctors at hand.
I'm honestly not even sure it ever happened. If it did, this is a very odd thing to claim. Why not call it what it is, severe malnurishment, dehydration, and sleep deprivation?
Sounds like a case of extreme exhaustion but who can tell with such little information?
That said, how addicted could this kid possibly be if he told his dad to get rid of his Playstation?
Andrew Eisen
I sure hope this kid saw a Psychiatrist and not just some ER doctor. To determine if one suffers from a mental illness, such as this addiction would have to be, there are certain standards that must be applied.
I think it was a Seizure IMO
I was thinking the same thing but absence seizures usually only last a few seconds. Unless he suffered from a very severe one, but I'm not sure if that happens with those types of seizures.
Not saying that game addiction doesn't exist, but this could be a zebra diagnosis. If you hear hooves, chances are it's a horse.
No, absence seizures can last up to several minutes.
I wonder how long he had the Playstation. How long does it take to develop a physical dependency on something that has no chemical effects on the body?
Read up on the psychology behind addiction, you can get addicted to enjoyable behaviour, but only a select few people actually have episodes in regards to this. For example, we all eat food, but not until we weigh 600lbs; We all have sex, but do not do so at the neglect of our other obligations; etc.
To say that all games are addicting because a few become addicted is tantemount to say all sex is gay because there are being engaging in gay sex.
you're missig the point that our body is a boiling pot of chemicals - it's the brain that constantly start chemical reactions allover the body to make it work and in stress conditions the brain could send wrong signals to che chemical reactions subsistem - as a matter of fact, the drugs main purpose is to alter the brain functionality so that it push chemical reactions in one direction or another depending on the drug.
To say that you can't get addicted to video games is kind of ignorant. You can get addicted to anything. They say that weed doesn't have any addictive substances in it, but there are lots of people who are dependent on it.
For it to go that far, that seems like a special isolated case that couldn't be replicated if you tried. I've gone on all night binges of playing all sorts of game systems (also durring all ages of my life) and have never had any adverse effects except for being a little sleepy.
I went over 48 hours without sleep once when I was young (birthday party), then slept for over 24 hours straight... I was on the living room floor asleep, and family came over at one point in time while I was asleep, and I wasn't woke up once, and my family is not quiet.
Fell asleep right before Simpsons was on, woke up right after it finished the next day. I was like, I missed the Simpsons? Then my parents were like, you missed a lot more than that. That was interesting...
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He needed sleep and food.
So getting him an xbox or wii would not be a problem? Who knew psychological addiction was so brand specific?
Soooo, where were the parents?
exactly, iirc i also read elsewhere that he was at a LAN party for something.
just like the WoW kid, the parents should've stepped in, theres a reason people under the age of 18 in most area's aren't deemed able to take care of , or make choices for themselves, and this is why they have PARENTS to tell them right and wrong still, and stop them from being stupid.
i think worst i ever did was a 48 hour binge on Quake 2 back in the day, but i distinctly recall my father kicking me off the comp in the middle of it and forcing me to get some sleep and something to eat that wasn't "junk food". Or else he was gonna trash the entire computer.
gotta say, i like the diagnosis the docs gave the kid though :p
quoted en plein
my 6yo nephew would kill to play PES2008 forever but his mo and his uncle (me) are always there to strip off his litle hands the joypad after 15 min. (well, 30 min while is kicking his uncle's arse playing against him).
So if it is this "Playstation addiction", then all we have to do is play Xbox 360 or Wii to avoid it? That's a load off my mind, I've barely touched my PlayStation 2 in the last 6 months!
heh i've got 2 PS2's (regions 1 and 2, i don't mod chip) and a PS3 as well as the PSP... i think i've got a playstation infestation! (wow that rhymes... )
can't say i've played any PS games though except Macross Ace Frontier in at least 2 months... wait... scratch that, i played Socom Confrontation last month for a bit before the shoddy PSN lag problems got the better of me and i went back to my PC and 360 for online gaming.. you know, the 2 systems that don't lag and take 3 hours to download a simple 500 meg file on a roadrunner connection..
"If I even think about it I want to throw up."
It's not nice from me to call him a loser, right?
Yeah, that would not be nice.
At this point, we just don't know what happened. Stroke? Brain disorder? Hyper exhaustion? Motion sickness? Seizure? Epileptic fit?
Who knows?
Andrew Eisen
Is stupidity a medical condition, because if it is, I know a lot of people that need a check up for it...
(okay, facepalm myself, I know, but I had to say it...)
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This story is so full of Bullshit I'm speechless.
Hunting the shadows of the troubled dreams.
You're right, this story has all the major aspects of "fake," I can't believe GP mentioned it. There are no sources to the article, it's in the just-far-enough-away country of "Italy," it originates in Anonova in the "weird" section, and there is no way that any kid in the world would say "games make them sick." It's a fake story and never happened.
Great so now we have console specific addiction. As if the console war wasn't bad enough. Next we'll have fanboys screaming about "PS3 is better cause it's more addicting!!!!!!"
"Right, because my addiction to being able to speak and realize who or what I am means my favorite console sucks."
Anyone using the "PS3 is more addicting" line is gonna be eaten alive xD.
Maybe he'll be alright once somebody gets him a Playstation 2?
Lucky for me, I don't have a playstation. But is there any other medical information from the boy we can have access to? Perhaps he went catatonic? Or maybe he just played the damn console for so long he didn't realize what happened. If you do anything for long periods of time, it is only natural that the body will shut down.
If you run for an excessive amount of time, you will collapse. If you eat a lot for a long time, you will collapse. If you watch tv for too long, you will collapse (Or just fall asleep, but if you force the body to watch said tv for so long, the body will collapse automatically). If you smoke too much, you will get sick. You get the idea.
Not only is this politician not telling us whether this boy was suffering from another mental disability (which, with cases like this, is a VERY real possibility) but if he has none, than he's probably going to blame the system for making it in the first place. You know people HERE will.
Hi folks, long time reader, first time I've posted on the new boards...
Poor kid.. probably got it drilled into his head that it was the Playstations fault he got sick.. stressed out over it instead because parents and doctors and now he feels ill if he even thinks about the Playstation..
Sounds a bit like a reverse Pavlovs Dog..
~jingles bell~
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It's like saying it's football syndrome when it's really dehydration.
E.T. used to have a similar effect on my Atari...
Seriously though, sounds almost exactly like an Abscence Seizure to me, photosensitivy induced, no direct 'seizure', but a complete obliviousness to surroundings, lack of response to stimuli and involuntary muscle spasms. It's often known as 'petit mal'.
My wife suffers from Epilepsy, so I had to learn about this stuff ;)
I think this also merits a...
*PICARD-PALM*
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"Game on, brothers and sisters." -Leet Gamer Jargon
you have my vote for epic win of the day!
Nobody has pointed out yet that doctors discovered he played a "marathon Playstation session" is entirely unrelated to how alert he was, and is thus a complete non sequitur.
I'll put some examples to illustrate exactly why his physical state and "Playstation session" are unrelated.
"The teenager couldn't speak and didn't seem to understand anything going on around him. Then doctors discovered he'd just(replace 'finished a marathon session on his new Playstation' with one of these):
watched 'The Simple Life'.
eaten a Taco Supreme.
listened to James Blunt.
found out he was adopted.
played Superman 64.
joined Scientology.
made love to a burrito.
swallowed a smoke detector.
stuffed salt up his nose.
learned he could get a million dollars from a nigerian prince.
installed Windows Vista.
read Perez Hilton.
read the book of Leviticus.
watched 'That's so Raven'."
Thus, it makes perfect sense!
Right? No? Alright.
Clearly there need to be higher educational standards in Italian Medical Schools. If they they took something this that doesn't usually cause problems and used it as a medical diagnosis in any other country, their butts would be out on the street and they'd be feeding their family by doing tricks behind the 7-11.
Also, I propose that politicians have a weekly limit of 30 minutes for political grandstanding.
Okay, I will have to make you cookies tomorrow. Thank you for the laugh.
I would also include, smoked one hell of a good joint.
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Fuck that, he gets one bigass cookie.
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"Game on, brothers and sisters." -Leet Gamer Jargon
A big-ass cookie AND the internet....
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" - Benjamin Franklin
One of both for you, too.
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"Game on, brothers and sisters." -Leet Gamer Jargon
You want the keys to my neighbor's Porsche too? He is a douche bag, so I dont feel bad about it...
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My diagnosis for the doctor is a slight irritation of the "BS" gland.
That's really scary. Hope the kid feels better. But there's got to be some better explanation. I can understand that it might be addiction but there's got to be something also wrong on the kids part too. Again, my condolances to the kid and hopes he feels better.
I just want to add that picture is pure GOLD!
I really hope that the doctors will approach what happend as a symptom of some greater problem and not the problem itself. Seriously, if playing a playstation renders you like you just had a stroke then there is quite likely a deeper medical issue here.
-Ultimately what will do in mankind is a person's fear of their own freedom-
This proofs that xBox 360 is better console.
"Italy"
Case closed.
A bit out of subject, but I think it exposes a bit of Italy's.. way of functionning.
Unless it changed in the past 10 years, prosecution works very akin to this ; you start guilty once trial begins, all you can do is prove yourself innocent.
That the boy was diagnosed with a mental illness by a "physically more inclined" doctor is clearly political fodder.
My only question is what game was he playing?
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" - Benjamin Franklin
This is totally an anecdotal account; based on no study or test what so ever.
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United we Stand, Divided we fall.
*Hands Brandon a cookie*
Hunting the shadows of the troubled dreams.
Did you genetically enhance some plant can create a cookie farm or something?
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Nope, "T3H i|\|T3R|\|3T$" did.
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"Game on, brothers and sisters." -Leet Gamer Jargon
i should mention that it's copy pasta
United we Stand, Divided we fall.
Meh, who cares?
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"Game on, brothers and sisters." -Leet Gamer Jargon
You know he didn't do this art right
http://standardgreyeditions.blogspot.com/2008/01/facepalm.html
bnm
Yeah, now I have a Verdana version of the ascii. The Arial one is more commonly seen.
Game Addiction is real. Everything can be addictive, if not physically then emotinoally. Cannabis isn't 'physically' addictive, but how many people seem to be addicted to it? Stop picking and choosing thing when they are convenient for you.
No-ones saying addiction isn't real, but the symptoms, according to this Politician are identical to a Absence Seizure. Trying to blame something like that on the game system, rather than on perfectly natural condition in young people, lots of kids have epileptic fits, (that don't often carry on into adulthood, but that is mostly because it is identifed and treated early) is not only irresponsible, it's dangerous.
Blaming a fit on 'Playstation addiction' means the child may not be getting the correct treatment, which is doing the child massive disfavour for the sake of political expendiency, so yes, if it was down to addiction, there'd be a point to saying it, but this doesn't sound like the symptoms of an addiction, any kind of addiction.
Yes, you pretty much summed up my thoughts right here. Trying to find a scape goat when there is the possibility of a very real medical condition is not just silly, but potentially deadly with a worse fit. It should be noted, if it was a fit, other things will trigger it off beyond a PS2 like just watching TV or flashing lights.
When I see some real professionals (YOU HEAR THAT COOPER LAWRENCE?) conduct some real research, on real people, in the real world, and come up with real answers, I'll look up from Left 4 dead and listen.
Don't do that. Everytime I look up from Left 4 Dead, I look down again to find a tank. Fucking tank.
See, this is a little different then the story I had read, which claimed the doctor had diagnosed it as Playstation Addiction, which would make absolutely no sense at all.
For the brief moment, let us assume that they were talking about some drug. Kid gets drug, takes too much, and winds up in the hospital... do they call that an addiction or an overdose?
Even if the Playstation WAS a drug, the diagnosis wouldn't have fit.
This is something VERY obvious. You need to sleep. You need to eat. You need to move around over a period of time. This has little to nothing to do with video games other then something that is distracting the kids. Parents would never let their kids watch TV for 24 hours strait.
Let me not get this confused with other issues. Staying up to 2am, if done responsibly, is not a problem. Staying up to 6AM, if it is not already part of your normal routine, could be particularly trying on your body. Staying up 24 hours is dangerous for just about anyone.
Anyway, the main point of my post is that while this could arguably be called PlayStation Overdose, calling it PlayStation Addiction is so obviously wrong as it would have to be motivated by another agenda.
I think it's better calling it a deficiency of something, rather than an overdose of something. Because it's the deficiency that more directly made the kid take a turn for the worse.
I was just using general terms and the condition that "if" the PS actually was drugs, that this still wouldn't be considered an addiction. The doctor that said that was a quack. Even calling it a Playstation Overdose would be inaccurate, but could be at least less obviously stupid then calling a problem that manefested that quickly from getting a new system and didn't happen in withdrawl as an addiction.
For those realists, it is likely a combination of dehydration and sleep deprivation, but that would spoil the story.