Play the grief away – Positive effects of playing a meaningful video game

Wagener, Gary Lee, University of Luxembourg (gary.wagener@uni.lu) / Holl, Elisabeth, University of Luxembourg (Elisabeth.holl@uni.lu) / Schablowski, Saskia, University of Luxembourg (saskia.schablowski.002@student.uni.lu) / Fairon, Tascha, University of Luxembourg (tascha.fairon.001@student.uni.lu / Melzer, André, University of Luxembourg (andre.melzer@uni.lu)

1Video games have become an integral part of society and have shown to have positive effects on mood (Russoniello et al., 2009), emotions and emotion regulation (Villani et al., 2018), depressive symptoms (Kowal et al., 2021), and general well-being (Granic et al., 2014). Also, prior research has shown potential positive effects on mood improvement for casual video games (e.g., Rieger et al., 2015; Russoniello et al., 2009). Therefore, the current lab study was conducted to test the effects on people’s affective state in the context of a meaningful video game (Gris) that deals with self-growth and healing after a traumatic event. It was hypothesized that playing the game leads to both mood improvement (i.e., reduced negative affect and increased positive affect in the pre-post PANAS [Watson et al., 1988]) as well as increased parasympathetic activity that indicates greater physiological relaxation (i.e., increased heart rate variability – HRV). Due to its immersive nature and its strong emotional themes, it was furthermore hypothesized that the extent of players’ reported pre-test depressive symptoms moderate the positive effects on mood (García Catalán et al., 2021; Vasilikaris, 2022). During the experiment, participants (N = 64) provided demographic information and answered their current affective state via PANAS before playing Gris for 20 minutes. Right after gameplay, participants rated the PANAS items again. HRV (indices: the root mean square of successive differences, high-frequency power [RMSSD], and the ratio between low-frequency [LF/HF] and high-frequency power [HF]) was assessed pre, during, and after gameplay. The results of the current study will be presented at the conference. The findings not only extend the general evidence base on the potentially beneficial role of video games and human-computer interaction, but in particular may illustrate the positive effects of meaningful video games on mental health and well-being.

2Video games / heart rate variability / mood improvement / depression / mental health