The World Health Organization and the American Psychiatric Association will classify video game addiction as a mental disorder in the 11th International Classification of Diseases.
Iowa State University Psychologist Doug Gentile says that to tell the difference between a healthy passion for gaming and a damaging addiction, it's best to consider when it becomes dysfunctional.
"And it can’t just be damaging to one area of your life," Gentile says. "When we get to the point of addiction, it starts damaging multiple areas of your life - your school functioning, your occupational functioning, your social and emotional and family functioning; and once it gets to that level, that’s where it’s clear it’s gotten out of balance.”
On this edition of River to River, host Ben Kieffer talks with Gentile as well as Andrew Doan, a former video game addict whose life and career was almost destroyed by an intense addiction to gaming.
