1. Sitting Too Much
While it is easy for you to lose yourself in games. Sitting down and playing for hours on end can actually have negative effects on your health. Researchers linked prolonged sitting to diabetes, poor heart health, weight gain, and other chronic health problems.
Not only can these problems be physical, sitting too much can also take a toll on your mental health without you realizing it. Including a rise in anxiety and depression.
To prevent these issues from arising you should take regular breaks. Set a timer on your phone or laptop to remind yourself to stand up and move around at least once every hour. Use these breaks to stretch, walk, or do other forms of light exercise. Improving blood circulation and reducing muscle stiffness.
2. Eye Strain
Eye strain can be particularly uncomfortable. It is caused by long periods of intense focus on your computer screen or another mobile device. Your eyes get tired from this kind of intense use. So to send you a message, you will feel them get sore, itchy, or dry. Causing a burning sensation in your eyes.
If you choose to ignore these symptoms after so long it can take a toll on your vision. With your ability to see becoming blurred you can have doubled vision.
Preventing eye strain can be relatively simple. There is something called the ‘20-20-20’ rule. For every 20 minutes, give your eyes a 20-second break, looking at something that is at least 20 feet away. This is an easy way to prevent these problems from affecting your sight.
3. Insomnia
Do you ever find yourself staring at the ceiling all night, not being able to sleep after a long drawn-out gaming session? This can be linked to Insomnia. A common sleep disorder that affects millions, extending beyond the normal difficulty of falling asleep.
Gaming can contribute to insomnia impacting both quantity and quality of sleep. This is due to blue light exposure. Screens emit blue light, which suppresses the production of melatonin. The hormone that is responsible for regulating our sleep-wake cycles. Prolonged exposure to screens can disrupt our natural sleep-inducing signals.
To prevent Insomnia from taking over and not allowing you any sleep, you should establish a consistent sleep schedule. Set a regular bedtime and wake-up time. Even on the weekends (as tempting as it is to stay up). This consistency will help regulate your body’s internal clock. Making it easier to fall asleep and wake up naturally.
4. Carpal Tunnel
Carpal tunnel is a numbness/tingling in the hand or arm. This is caused by a pinched nerve in the rest. It can be associated with gaming. Especially if you are engaging in prolonged repetitive hand movements.
If left untreated it can lead to long-term effects and complications. With chronic pain developing and even extending up the arm. Leading to the muscles in your hand and thumb atrophying (shrinking) due to the reduced nerve stimulation.
If you are beginning to experience this, maybe think twice about blowing it off. Do some wrist exercises and stretches to promote wrist flexibility and help your body reduce the built-up tension in your hands. Also, ensure that your gaming setup encourages good posture and hand positioning. Reducing the stress put onto your wrists and other joints.
5. Obesity
Obesity is a disorder that involves excessive body fat. Often resulting from taking in more calories than that which are being burned by exercise and other normal daily activities. You are considered obese when your body mass index is 30 or greater.
Often when gaming it is easy to have snacking or poor dietary tendencies. Consuming sugary snacks and drinks or other kinds of processed food. Combined with a lack of physical activity, this can contribute to weight gain. This is linked to a very wide range of health issues and complications that can affect systems in the body.
Adopt a balanced and healthy lifestyle as a gamer. For both your gaming and physical well-being. You can schedule regular exercises that you enjoy, like walking, jogging, cycling, or other sports. You can also use fitness-focused games on VR that encourage movement. This allows you to keep doing what you love while letting you take care of your body simultaneously.
6. Social Isolation
Gaming can open opportunities to make plenty of friends in the online world. However, it can still isolate you if you are choosing this reality over going outside to hang out with friends who you can physically interact with. As humans, we are not built to be alone in a room all day.
Over time if you don’t take a breather every once in a while to spend time with your loved ones. It can end up putting a huge strain on the relationships you have with your friends and family. This kind of social isolation can take a toll on your mental health, leading to an increase in social anxiety when you do go out, depression, cognitive decline, and more.
Take the time to go outside and do something fun that allows you to spend quality time with your loved ones. Whether it’s just going out to eat at a restaurant, sitting down for a movie night, or going to the park. By taking that time you will save yourself the heartache that can be caused by neglecting your relationships.
7. Poor Posture
An overextended time of practicing poor posture can lead to various problems. Such as back pain, joint degeneration, and even spinal dysfunction.
If your poor posture isn’t addressed it can start to affect your balance and coordination. Increasing the risk of falling, especially in older adults. It can also affect your overall flexibility. Giving you muscle imbalances and a decreased range of motion in joints.
Be mindful of the kind of posture you use throughout the day. Whether you are sitting, standing, or walking. By maintaining awareness you can practice good posture habits. Allowing you to stand tall. You can also try adjusting your chair so that your feet are flat on the floor, keeping your knees at hip level.
8. Desensitization
Violence in video games has become something very normalized in our current times. With no one blinking an eye when a new fighter or killer game is released. You may not know this, but repeated exposure to certain content (violence) or stimuli within video games can affect you.
Over time this can begin to potentially influence your perceptions and reactions to dangerous real-life situations. Having less of an emotional impact on aggressive behavior.
You should always stay informed about the potential effects of gaming on behavior and mental health. Being aware of the research and discussions on the topic will help you make informed choices. Balancing the difference in worlds between reality and virtual reality.
9. Migraines
Migraines are a little different from your usual headaches. They usually get brought on at first with an impact on your vision. Causing blurred spots and making it hard to focus. After that, it’ll begin to make your head throb with severe pain that pulses usually on one side of your head.
Migraine attacks have multiple triggers. Such as a drop in estrogen levels, alcohol use, stress, and sleep deprivation. It can also be caused by an overuse of intense eye focus from staring at a screen for long amounts of time.
If you are someone who experiences migraine attacks from time to time while gaming, you can prevent this by recognizing triggers. Such as sudden flashing colors or lights. Also, remember to close your eyes to allow some time for your retinas to rest.
10. Hearing Loss
From the sound levels games are often played for long lengths at a time. This can lead to hearing loss, as they often exceed recommended explore levels. Hearing loss at first can look mild at first, for example; your mom talking to you but you don’t hear her unless you turn to focus. To the more extreme of not being able to hear anything at all.
Gaming has often been associated with hearing loss. Most wear headphones that will blast extreme sound levels directly into the eardrum. It is advised that you should not play the sound of the game you are playing at or above 85 decibels. With the risk increasing as the volume level does.
Just like the 20-20-20 rule for eye strain, there is also a rule of thumb to ensure safe listening while gaming. It is called the 60/60 rule. This means when setting your volume, set it to no more than 60% on any device. Limiting exposure to no more than 60 minutes.
