Research carried out by an Australian psychology graduate student into the concept of videogame addiction has found "that gaming doesn't cause social problems, and social problems are not driving people to gaming." This flies in the face of the common perception that excessive gaming stunts the growth of players' social skills.

The ongoing discussion among members of the American Medical Association as to whether to make video game addiction a clinical condition is reminiscent of the debate regarding whether obesity ought to be classified a diagnosable disease. An excellent article that ran a couple of years back in issue 14.10 of WIRED magazine cast doubt on the idea that obesity is a sickness and shed light on the process by which possible conditions become labelled official diseases -- a process heavily influenced by the pharmaceutical industry, collectively colloquialized as "Big Pharma."

"What is a disease?" writes author Thomas Goetz. "For the pharmaceutical industry, it's a business model. Disease offers an opportunity to develop and market drugs that help people get better and, along the way, help companies make a profit."

So, as far as drug companies are concerned, the more diseases, disorders, and syndromes that are officially recognized, the merrier they will be. No shocker there.

With this in mind, the vaguely defined and understood notion of videogame addiction seems a perfect condition to be targeted for elevation to official affliction status. And, indeed, there are already psychopharmacological cocktails being administered to treat it.

It'd be speculation to suggest whether excessive game playing meets the medical requirements to be classified a psychological addiction. However, even if it were a given, it would seem a nebulous affliction at best, with the potential for plenty of false diagnoses brought on by parents concerned about sensational reports they've read about people dying from exhaustion while playing an online game.

Before giving video game addiction society's stamp of approval and prescribing behaviour altering medications to avid gamers, the interests of all concerned parties should be taken into account.