(Sehn-)Sucht Computerspiel: New study on computer game dependency published

“Computer game dependency” is defined in the current social and scientific discourse by medico-psychological perspectives, the players are tendently conceptualized as “ill.” The dissertation by Nadine Jukschat, published at BELTZ Juventa as a book, takes a different position and sketches dependent computer games. In the tradition of social scientific addiction research as a form of deviant behavior, the author asks about the social and biographical condition of the phenomenon, and reconstructs on the basis of biographical interviews. The prerequisite process of the emergence and consolidation of a dependent computer game practice is related to the biographical problems in which the players fail in their daily lives. Computer game dependence does not appear to be the expression of a pathological need but as an effort of the players to experience recognition, belonging and autonomy in the socially desired sense – whereby they, however, marked as “dependent”, always get into the social offside.

Through this change in perspective, a dependent computer game practice becomes visible not only as a paradoxical failure attempt to control life, but also reveals various dimensions of the phenomenon, which have been neglected in the medical-psychologically dominated computer game dependency research.

Nadine Jukschat
(Sehn-)Sucht Computerspiel.
Bedingungen der Entstehung und Verstetigung abhängiger Computerspielpraxis: ein rekonstruktiver Ansatz

432 Seiten
ISBN: 978-3-7799-3707-4

For more information about the book and ordering options, please visit: https://www.beltz.de/fachmedien/erziehungs_und_sozialwissenschaften/buecher/produkt_produktdetails/35162-sehn_sucht_computerspiel.html