Casual video games used to reduce depression

GREENVILLE, N.C. - We're all guilty of playing those casual video games like bejeweled on facebook, but a new study, the first of its kind, done right here at ECU shows you might actually be doing more than killing time, you could be improving your mental state.

In the Nine on Your Side's Health Report we take a look at how you can get a new high score in your own game of health:

It's an approach that strays from conventional wisdom: video games that not only offer a good time, but improve your mental health as well.

"What we're discovering is that people gravitate toward these games for a lot of reasons and one of them is self medication," said Carmen Russoniello, Director of the Biofeedback Clinic at ECU.

It’s self medicating with casual video games like Bejeweled and Peggle.

Russoniello's study, done with ECU's Department of Recreation and Leisure, shows those same games reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety by more than 50 percent.

"What we found was, and I've been doing research for a long time, I kind of suspected it would have some impact, but I was quite shocked actually by the results of it," said Russoniello.

So how much is too much?  Can you sit around and play these games all day and you're going to be 100 percent healthy?

"We saw the change in 30 minutes over three times a week.  We don't know if you play 10 times, if that's going to have a negative affect on you.  It might not have the same impact and that still needs further study," said Russoniello.

It's a step in a new direction toward helping the more than 20 million Americans suffering from depression and anxiety.

Russoniello says the study only pertain to casual video games which tend to have a therapeutic affect.  Other genre's like action or violence games tend to have the opposite affect.

--- Original Story ---

GREENVILLE, N.C. - A year-long study by East Carolina University’s Psychophysiology Lab and Biofeedback Clinic revealed casual video games reduce depression and anxiety.

Nearly 60 subjects, all meeting the criteria of clinical depression, participated in the study, which involved three family-friendly, non-violent puzzle games: Bejeweled 2^®, Peggle^® and Bookworm^® Adventures. (All of the games are made by PopCap Games, underwriter of the study.) It found an average reduction in depression symptoms of 57% in the experimental (“video game”) group.  The study, the first such research ever to measure the efficacy of video games in reducing depression and anxiety, also found significant reduction in anxiety, as well as improvements in all aspects of mood, among study subjects who played the casual video games.

“The results of this study clearly demonstrate the intrinsic value of certain casual games in terms of significant, positive effects on the moods and anxiety levels of people suffering from any level of depression,” stated Dr. Carmen Russoniello, Director of the Psychophysiology Lab and Biofeedback Clinic at ECU and the professor who oversaw the study (as well as previous studies involving the same games' effects on stress levels). “In my opinion the findings support the possibility of using prescribed casual video games for treating depression and anxiety as an adjunct to, or perhaps even a replacement for, standard therapies including medication. Remarkably, these games had both short term (after 30 minutes of game play) and long term (after one month) effects when compared to the control group. Equally important, the data supports the hypothesis that casual video games contain intrinsic qualities that, when played, provoke physiological and biochemical changes consistent with positive changes in mood and anxiety.” 

An estimated 20.9 American adults suffer from a mood disorder. More than two thirds of those are cases of major depression. That's according to the National Institute of Mental Health in the United States. Depressive disorders often co-occur with anxiety disorders. Approximately 40 million American adults (about 18 percent of all U.S. adults) have an anxiety disorder. 

Additional details, along with findings of previous studies, are available at www.edu.ecu/biofeedback. 

Nine On Your Side's Alex Freedman will have more on the study tonight on the Nightside.