With the popularity of hi-tech devices (smartphones, tablets, and laptops), playing online or offline games has become a prominent activity among young individuals since. Young people develop a powerful connection with massively multi-player online role-playing games (MMORPGs). MMORPGs run continuously in actual time, feature social and competitive aspects, making devotion to the game mandatory. While offline games end at some point or become repetitive, MMORPGs are endless, because the main feature of MMORPGs is its system of goals and achievements. As you play, your character advances by gaining experience points “levelling up” from one level to the next, while collecting valuables and weapons— becoming wealthier and stronger. These applications allowed users anonymity, allowing them to create their own social identities, raising the users’ self-esteem. It is this anonymity that gives those with low self-confidence and lacking social skills the desire to create a virtual life for themselves on the Internet. In these cases, the Internet becomes a substitute for real-life social interaction, giving the user an escape from reality. Anyone can become addicted, as it is a combination of personality type and Internet application that causes overuse leading to addiction. However, individual’s context is a significant factor that marks the dividing line between excessive gaming and gaming addiction, and the game context can gain particular importance for players, depending on their life situation and gaming preferences. The cultural context is significant because it embeds the gamer in a community with shared beliefs and practices, endowing their gaming with a particular meaning. Young individuals usually play MMORPGs for entertainment, excitement, challenge seeking, emotional coping, and escaping from reality to virtually to fulfil their unsatisfied needs or motivations. Immersion in the game is denoted by discovery, i.e., exploring the game and “hidden” game content, role-playing via one’s avatar, customization of one’s online character (such as sex, race, profession, appearance), and escapism, i.e., playing to avoid real life. Escapism is an aspect of mood modification whereby individuals suffering from addictions induce a subjective shift in their mood by engaging in addictive behavior, making the latter a coping strategy to deal with everyday problems. Although, moderate use of MMORPGs are associated with good psychological health and more positive academic orientation than non-use or high levels of use. However, a small proportion of gamers with overuse of MMORPGs might have shown problematic gaming behaviors such as insomnia, attention problems, poor academic performance, anxiety, depressive symptoms, deterioration of interpersonal relationships, family conflicts, youth violence or crimes, problems with verbal memory, low well-being high loneliness, lower self- esteem, lower satisfaction with daily life, aggression and hostility. This extensive list shows that
we must take seriously Internet gaming problems as they can affect the individual negatively in a variety of ways.
MMORPGs: How you become vulnerable
The behavior is salient (it preoccupies the individual with gaming).
The individual uses the behavior to change their mood (i.e., gaming is used to escape reality or create a feeling of euphoria).
Tolerance develops (the individual needs increasingly more time to feel the same effect).
Withdrawal symptoms occur upon discontinuation of the behavior (the individual feels anxious, depressed, and irritable if we prevent them from playing).
Inter-personal and intra-personal conflict develops because of the behavior (the individual has problems with their relationship, job, and hobbies, and lack of success in abstinence).
Upon discontinuation of the behavior, the individual experiences relapse (they re-start gaming). Studies shows that MMORPGs share similarities with other obsessive and compulsive behaviors, like gambling addiction and compulsive shopping, since these disorders lack chemical dependence.
MMORPGs throughout the valley is a widespread activity among our adolescents, and a substantial proportion of adolescents may exhibit addictive behaviours regarding MMORPGs. Young concluded that users become addicted, and that there is a potential for more addictive applications in the future. So, special attention should be paid to those adolescents vulnerable to MMORPG addiction. Given that adolescence is a time in which people experience significant biological, psychological, and social changes, effective education and intervention programs are needed to help adolescents and youths successfully navigate the developmental challenges.
Author is pursuing PhD from Department of Linguistic, University of Kashmir.