Gaming for long hours can trigger 'automatic' impulses: Study

Playing video games excessively can cause ‘automatic thoughts, impulses and behaviour', such as involuntary movement and verbal outbursts, new research has revealed.

Respondents to the study - carried out by scientists at the Nottingham Trent University's International Gaming Research Unit - aid that they had experienced brief dissociations and felt urges to perform in-game actions for a short period of time.

What they did
Some gamers reported involuntary movement of fingers and arms while looking for ‘gamepads in the air', or had unusual reactions to real-life objects, such as ducking at CCTV cameras. Others approached game-associated objects ‘with the intention to shoot them with a non-existing gun'.

While most of the experiences were ‘funny, amusing, or normal', some gamers felt so embarrassed that they thought it was a ‘reason to quit playing'.