Why Healthy Gaming is Not an Oxymoron:  How to Raise a Health Gamer by Dr. Alok Kaonjia – a Review

“Success isn’t the destination we are aiming for here; it is an ongoing process,” Dr. K writes, adding, “The most important thing to remember is that you and your child are in this together. Now, it’s time to really form an alliance and solidify your plans together.” – Dr. Alok Kanjojia, author of How to Raise a Healthy Gamer

by SB Veda

The author of How to Raise a Healthy Gamer, while being a psychiatrist, introduces himself as one of the 160 million Americans afflicted with a gaming problem – in that once they start, they can’t stop. Dr. K, as he is known in the book, had been so addicted to video games that it almost ruined his life!   He credits his parents guiding him to visit India, and use meditative techniques to change his life. Also, the culture shock of seeing how the ‘other half’ of the world lives, had some impact.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Bluebird (14 March 2024); The Smithson, 6 Briset Street, London EC1M 5NR distributed in India by Pan Macmillan
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1035025892
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1035025893

What if your kids are already in India? Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) while is referenced in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder V, which is essentially the bible for the American Psychiatric Association on the classification and characteristics off mental disorders, hasn’t yet been classified as a disease in the same way as alcoholism or drug addiction is.

That said, the DSM V lists a whole range of characteristics, which typify compulsive behaviour and its impacts. These include:

• Preoccupation with gaming
• Withdrawal symptoms when gaming is taken away or not possible (sadness, anxiety, irritability)
• Tolerance, the need to spend more time gaming to satisfy the urge
• Inability to reduce playing, unsuccessful attempts to quit gaming
• Giving up other activities, loss of interest in previously enjoyed activities due to gaming
• Continuing to game despite problems
• Deceiving family members or others about the amount of time spent on gaming
• The use of gaming to relieve negative moods, such as guilt or hopelessness
• Risk, having jeopardized or lost a job or relationship due to gaming

Dr. K notes the paradox and attributes it to the fact that the establishment of the AMA is likely of the demographic profile to have never actually played an internet-based digital game that is modern and uses the sophisticated technology available to gaming companies to hook gamers. Their idea of a video game would likely be Pacman or Space invaders, archaic games which were created at the nascency of the home personal computer back in the 1980s.

Still, the extent to which I have observed office colleagues, in the past, glued to their computer screens, playing Solitaire to fill the minutes of their corporate captivity as they await their freedom at 5 pm, boggles the mind. This isn’t considered addiction.

The games that are available to gamers, these days are highly sophisticated. The activities don’t just involve shooting things. A person can design their own avatar in the ‘gamingverse’, and is rewarded as they move up to higher skill levels. The psychological reinforcement that they receive is not simply confined to one’s own space. Given that these games are played on line, people play against each other, sometimes across time zones and certainly borders, becoming part of a gaming community.

Communication via messaging and social media apps centered on gaming, promote internet gaming in a way that playing stand-alone video games never did. But we are getting ahead of ourselves in Dr. K’s book.

After introducing himself, Dr. K explains how modern games impact the brain chemistry of a gamer, in particular, the reward circuitry of the brain. He explains the importance of neurotransmitters like dopamine and how they are responsible for the sensation of pleasure, which is experienced by all of us when we experience something that gratifies us such as eating something tasty, achieving a goal like getting an “A” on a test, winning a soccer match, and the like.

Dr. K, using lay vernacular, describes how gaming, in essence, floods the brain with pleasure giving dopamine, essentially creating a ‘high’ akin to the type of neuro-response that is elicited by a narcotic. While Dr. K is careful to avoid contradicting the DSM V outright, his explanation of how gaming impacts the brain certainly mirrors that of addiction.

Dr. K goes deeper than the brain chemistry. He discusses the social interactions, which create the community that gamers, especially, in frame of the post-Covid-19 social isolation way in which we have learned to socialize – that is without actual human contact – reinforces an ecosystem designed to make one dependent upon internet gaming just to feel a sense of belonging. By this time, one is well into the first section of the book, aptly title: UNDERTAND.

Once Dr. K has grounded the reader in essentials of the problem, he sets about laying out potential ways by which parents can cope and influence their kid or kids’ behaviour. The first step involves communicating with one’s child. This section is just as appropriately titled: TALK: how to talk to your gamer.

As one might imagine, the way in which one can positively engage with one’s child depends on how old they are. But as Dr. K points out, in gaming there is another layer: “Stage trumps age.” In other words, how deep the child has gone into gaming coupled with their own sense of self-awareness, influences profoundly how one should communicate with one’s child. Dr. K. details how this can be done.

Dr. K stresses the importance of parent and child joining the ‘same team’ as it pertains to their gaming habits. “Success isn’t the destination we are aiming for here; it is an ongoing process,” Dr. K writes, adding, “The most important thing to remember is that you and your child are in this together. Now, it’s time to really form an alliance and solidify your plans together.”

At this point, my faith in Dr. K becomes shaken. As the parent of a distinctly unhealthy gamer (we’ve had to take all electronic devices away from our fifteen-year-old boy) our experience is that he is totally intransient to the when it comes to any discussion of how he spends his leisure time, much less talk about how to apply limits to his use of electronic devices.

In the chapter called “Communication 101,” Dr. K explains how to communicate with one’s child in a non-judgmental way, adding a sample dialogue to exemplify his points. While the advice is useful, in his dialogue, he makes the rather incredible assumption that one’s child (in my case a teenager) will respond sincerely and honestly to the questions). It something out of a parenting manual, with child responses that are completely earnest and innocent, not a hint of sarcasm glancing the interaction. Unfortunately, I did not find Dr. K’s example to be remotely realistic. Admittedly, it could be a reflection of the dynamic between my little monster and me. Still, I cannot think of any interaction I’ve witnessed in 2024 that hasn’t been faked in which teenagers talked like how Dr. K depicted in his sample dialogue.

The chapter in which Dr. K talks about creating structure in one’s child’s life is one that I found more useful, though much of it is common sense.

Part III of the book, called “ACT,” details ways in which a parent can actively change a gamer’s behaviour incorporating an incentive or disincentive system in how one grants time to the child to game.

Dr. K brings in the Vedic Model of the Mind, which is something he learned while in India – and he claims to apply this in his psychiatry practice to help rid an individual of tendencies and habits that are detrimental to the patient. Without going into detail about the model, my own engagement with various forms of Western treatment is not incongruent to what Dr. K describes. So, one could conclude that it reinforces the efficacy of the model. Another reaction is that its introduction is meant to connect specifically with Indian readers.

I wouldn’t call this a gimmick, exactly. One of the failures of treatments like Alcoholics Anonymous and other so called twelve step programs to help people cope with addiction are culturally biased and don’t really work for people who have an entrenched Indian upbringing. So, introducing a more culturally conducive means of behaviour modification makes sense if one’s target audience is Indian, specifically Hindu or Buddhist.

Dr. K recognizes that other disorders such Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) could well be contributing to the problem, and he suggests ways in which such concurrent disorders can be addressed within what we soon realize is a program that he is applying called “Healthy Gamer.” To his credit, Dr. K refers to these concurrent disorders as “challenges.” But, in some cases they are medical disorders that other doctors might address in ways that are different than that advised by Dr. K.

At the tail end of the book, Dr. K lays out his “Healthy Gamer” program, including a timeline with steps to take during the length of the program. If the reader is lucky, s/he will apply the techniques detailed in the appendices dealing with the program, and it will work.

If not, there is always something that lies in wait with any self-help program: The Upsell. Fortunately, Dr. K spares the reader any additional forms of help that typically are designed to keep the parent of the afflicted child dependent on the healer or guru or doctor.

Regardless of whether the lessons detailed in Dr. K’s book are effective for one’s child, it is an important addition to the literature on the topic, which is, at present, virtually non-existent. The fact that it is presented in a conversational style and in easily assimilated stages, makes the book stand apart from academic literature on the subject.

For anyone facing this growing problem with their child or children, How to Raise a Health Gamer by Dr. Aolok Kanojia, offers a smooth and potentially effective path by which one’s child can change and a greater understanding between the generations can be reached. For a parent with a problem gamer in the family, the book is certainly worth reading and applying in their attempts to deal with the problem, especially in India.