Aim, Shoot, Deplete: Playing Video Games Depletes Self-Regulatory Resources

Abstract

Two experiments investigated whether playing video games impaired subsequent self regulation. In Experiment 1 (n = 43), participants either played a video game (i.e., Quake III) for 10 min or just browsed the Internet for the same time interval. Participants in the video game condition had slower response time than participants in the no-game condition. In Experiment 2 (n = 94), either participants played Quake III, or watched Quake III game scenes, or they were asked to suppress their thought for 10 min. Participants in the game-playing condition and thought suppression condition showed less persistence on a given unsolvable anagram task than participants in the game-watching condition. Overall, the findings confirm the idea that playing video game consumes self-regulatory sources due to active instead of passive responses in a highly demanding game environment.

Notes

¹ Relatively little research has investigated the positive consequences of playing violent video games on perceptual and motor skills. These studies revealed significant associations with playing violent video games and enhanced hand–eye coordination and increased multitask ability (Green & Bavelier, 2003).

² Both positive and negative mood were tested separately and results were same with the composite score of mood. We also compared mood differences in experiment conditions for both Study 1 and Study 2. There were no significant mood differences between game-playing and no-game condition, t(41) = 1.32, ns, for Study 1 (M_game-playing = 2.85, SD = .63; M_{no game} = 2.65, SD = .55). Similarly, mood differences between game-playing, thought-suppression, and game-watching conditions were not statistically significant, F(2, 91) = 0.99, ns, for Study 2 (M_game-playing = 2.63, SD = .55; M_{thought suppression} = 2.72, SD = .49; M_{game-watching} = 2.68, SD = .57).

³ We conducted post hoc power analyses using G*Power (Faul, Erdfelder, Lang, & Buchner, 2007) to indicate whether the desired power of .80 (Cohen, 1988) was achieved in Study 1. Results revealed that the observed power was .68 for both independent samples t test and ANCOVA, suggesting that our sample size was not good enough to reject false Null Hypotheses. The main effect of game on LDT performance, however, was quite large according to Cohen’s (1988) effect size conventions (d = .76 for t test and f = .38 for ANCOVA).

⁴ A post hoc power analysis revealed that the observed power of the ANCOVA was .86, indicating that a desired level of power was obtained in Study 2. Furthermore, the effect size of the experimental manipulation was quite large according to Cohen’s (1988) effect size conventions (f = .35).

⁵ Following Tice et al.’s (2007) work, we also examined the question whether depleted ego-resources would be replenished using 5-min video clips, inducing positive mood video clips on self-regulatory resources. We could not find any replenishment effects of video-clip sessions on persistence duration.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mehmet Harma

Mehmet Harma is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Istanbul Kemerburgaz University, Istanbul, Turkey. He has B.S. in Psychology. He obtained M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the Middle East Technical University, Turkey. His research interests include self-regulation, emotion, and human–computer interaction.

Timuçin Aktan

Timuçin Aktan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Çağ University, Mersin, Turkey. He has B.S. in Psychology. He obtained a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the Middle East Technical University, Turkey. His research interests include self-regulation, stereotypes, and measuring game experiences.

Kursat Cagiltay

Kursat Cagiltay is a Professor in the Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology at Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey. He has a B.S. in Mathematics and an M.S. in Computer Engineering from METU. He holds a double Ph.D. in Cognitive Science and Instructional Systems Technology from Indiana University, Bloomington.