Have you ever experienced such a "supernatural event" -
Once the game is opened, you can no longer feel the passage of time, until you suddenly look out the window and find that it is dark;
Once you play the game, you can no longer feel thirsty and hungry, and when you hear your stomach grumbling, you find that you haven't eaten or drunk for a day.
Why does playing games make us so addicted?
Perhaps the failure of time perception and the disappearance of physical sensations are the culprits.
Time perception does not allow us to lose subjective awareness of the body
Previously, psychologists proposed the concept of time perception, and they believed that everyone has their own subjective judgment about the passage of time.
In other words, we can all be aware that time is passing, but our perception of the passage of time is not the same.
Studies have explored the difficulty of people to accurately estimate time when playing games.
The researchers recruited two groups of participants, one group of participants to play an 8-minute game, while the other group, as a control, was asked to read an 8-minute book. The results found that participants who played the 8-minute game felt that time passed faster and estimated the time elapsed while playing the game more inaccurately than those who read the 8-minute book.
Why?
Researchers explain this phenomenon with attention gate theory [2]. The theory is that when we notice something, the "floodgates" of our internal attention open. The attention that this "floodgate" can pass through is limited, and if we focus on one thing, our attention to other things will be weakened.
When we play games, our attention is focused on the games that are stimulating and fun. At this moment, the internal attention "gate" is almost only open for the game, so the part of our attention that we use to perceive time is difficult to pass through this "gate", making it difficult for us to notice the passage of time.
The mistake of perception of the passage of time makes us "accidentally" play from morning to dark, so what makes us not even feel sleepy and hungry?
Weakened bodily sensations leave us without objective feedback from the body
When playing video games, we enter the virtual world of the game and substitute ourselves into the characters of the game, as if we had actually come to that virtual world. Especially now many third-person perspective games will make the player's sense of substitution stronger and easier to immerse themselves in.
In this case, our awareness of various bodily sensations (such as hunger, thirst, exhaustion, and pain) decreases, which can even lead to changes in homeostatic functions such as blood flow and skin temperature [3].
Scholars such as Swinkels from Radberg University in the Netherlands have confirmed this with research. They recruited 142 adult participants and asked them to rate how often they felt physical sensations such as hunger, pain, and drowsiness while playing games (such as "When you were playing games, how often did you forget to eat?"). ”）
Participants then needed to recall a video game they had recently played on their computer, preferably in an immersive way, recalling the situation and state in which they were playing the game.
Finally, participants wrote down the name of the game and again evaluated the frequency of physical sensations they felt while playing the game.
The researchers analyzed the differences in participants' evaluations of "how often they felt hunger and drowsiness while playing games." It was found that after recalling the games they had played, the participants' physical sensations such as hunger, pain, and drowsiness decreased.
That is: when playing games, our awareness of the signals sent by the body is reduced.
What can we do in the face of the game above?
Receiving time information and perceiving our own state is the key to our survival, and various sensations (such as pain, hunger, itching, etc.) are health signals given to us by the body.
If we ignore these body signals and play games without sleeping or eating, our health will be damaged and even lead to death. Although such incidents are rare, such harm deserves our vigilance.
So, how can we avoid playing games without sleeping?
Find a way to remind yourself
As we mentioned earlier, it is precisely because of the immersive experience that games bring that we neglect the perception of time and body.
Therefore, we can consciously get ourselves out of the "muddy" state, to be aware of our own life state, and set some "reminders" for ourselves through alarms and other means.
Plan your own life
Neglect of time and one's own physical sensations also stems from the disorder of one's own life. When we don't know what to do in the next moment, we become more likely to indulge in the game of the moment.
Therefore, we can make a daily plan, make the most of our time and persevere, and make our lives more meaningful.
bibliography
[1] Tobin, S., & Grondin, S. (2009). Video games and the perception of very long durations by adolescents. Computers in Human Behavior, 25, 554-559.
[2] Zakay, D., Block, R. (1997). A Temporal Cognition. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 6, 12-16.
[3] Swinkels, L. M. J., Veling, H., & van Schie, H. T. (2021). Playing videogames is associated with reduced awareness of bodily sensations. Computers in Human Behavior, 125, 106953. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2021.106953
Author | Passers-by
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This article is reprinted from the Beijing Normal University of Psychology (ID: bnupsychology) with permission, if you need to reprint it for the second time, please contact the original author