Playing the Male Card to Explain an Addiction

September 21, 2008 · Filed Under General, Blogging, Gaming

This is a guest post by Kelly Kilpatrick

How often have you found yourself exasperated to the point of wanting to throw something when your boyfriend, spouse, son or any other male you know glues themselves to their gaming console and is oblivious to what you’re saying and to your very existence? Take heart, for you’re in the company of almost every other woman in the world. But if you’re hoping to get together for a good ol’ bitching session about the bad boys and their mean machines, you’re out of luck ‘cause the men were just given the most wonderful reasons possible to explain their addiction logically – we’re just genetically designed that way!

A study conducted by Professor Alan Reiss of Stanford University, California, attempted to figure out which gender was more territorial by making a group of men and women play a specially designed video game. fMRI scans that monitored the area of the brain that’s responsible for reward and addiction revealed that this region was more activated in the case of all the men who took part in the experiment. The results prove that men are more prone to addiction because:

Games bring out the territorial instincts of men, a throwback to our caveman days when our ancestors fought over spaces they considered their own. Games that feature territorial expansion and conquests tend to score high on the must-have list of men. In the study, the more territory or space the men gained, the more the activity noticed in the reward and addiction center.
Men feel more rewarded by the outcome of video games than women. So it’s only natural that they turn to this form of entertainment when they desire a harmless pick-me-up.
The male of the species loves to be in control, especially of things that are considered difficult to master – which is why you see men going ga-ga over powerful cars that eat up the miles thanks to powerful engines and why men are besotted with beautiful women (usually those way out of their league) and want to make them their own (and not just with marriage in mind).
Video games offer a sort of escape from the humdrum of daily life – where else can you can assume exciting avatars and battle the evil forces that threaten the earth and build financial empires single-handedly and emerge a tycoon who’s worth a lot of worthless money? Let’s face it girls, video games are the stuff that male dreams are made of!

This post was contributed by Kelly Kilpatrick,who writes on the subject of the graduate school scholarships. She invites your feedback at kellykilpatrick24 at gmail dot com.

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