Empirical evidence for robust personality-gaming disorder associations from a large-scale international investigation applying the APA and WHO frameworks

Abstract

Disordered gaming has gained increased medical attention and was recently included in the eleventh International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) by the World Health Organization (WHO) after its earlier inclusion in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (fifth revision) (DSM-5) as an emerging disorder by the American Psychiatric Association (APA). Although many studies have investigated associations between personality and disordered gaming, no previous research compared the differential associations between personality and disordered gaming with time spent gaming. Due to the novelty of the WHO diagnostic framework for disordered gaming, previous research focused mainly on the associations between personality and disordered gaming in relation to the APA framework. Beyond that, these studies are generally limited by small sample sizes and/or the lack of cross-cultural emphasis due to single-country sampling. To address these limitations, the present study aimed to investigate the associations between personality and gaming behavior in a large and culturally heterogeneous sample (N = 50,925) of individuals from 150 countries. The results obtained suggested that low conscientiousness and high neuroticism were robustly associated with disordered gaming across both the APA and WHO frameworks. Interestingly, personality associations with weekly time spent gaming were smaller. The findings of the present study suggest that personality is of higher importance to predict disordered gaming compared to weekly time spent gaming.

Fig 1. Personality comparisons among potentially disordered and non-disordered gamers according to WHO framework.

All contrasts were statistically significant at the p < .001 level (SD as follows in the same order as in the figure from left to right; Openness: .58/.66; Conscientiousness: .66/.68; Extraversion: .78/.84; Agreeableness: .61/.68; Neuroticism: 0.83/0.81).

Fig 2. Personality comparisons among potentially disordered and non-disordered gamers according to APA framework.

All contrasts were statistically significant at the p < .001 level (SD as follows in the same order as in the figure from left to right; Openness: .58/.64; Conscientiousness: .65/.70; Extraversion: .78/.79; Agreeableness: .61/.68; Neuroticism: .82/.79).