Millions of people play the game World of Warcraft. According to an article written by James Ransom-Wiley, that number has now surpassed 10 million subscribers (Ransom). He states that this is “half the population of Australia.” So this brings up that everlasting question; is World of Warcraft addictive? To explore this question, we first must define what a gaming addiction is. Dr. Kimberly Young, of the Center for Internet Addiction Recovery defines it as

         “Internet gaming addiction can be defined as a compulsive behavior which interferes with normal living and causes severe stress on family, friends, loved ones, and one's school or work environment. For the gaming addict, the game becomes a compulsive habit that completely dominates the addict's life. Gaming addicts make the Internet a priority more important than family, friends, and work. The game becomes the organizing principle of addicts' lives. They are willing to sacrifice what they cherish most in order to preserve and continue their unhealthy behavior.”

The site wowdetox.com has a large user base of people who say they have overcome their addiction. They state that they no longer feel the need to play, and that they are happier without World of Warcraft. In a Journal Article written by Dr. Der-Hsiang Huang, he concludes that video games are in fact addictive. Huang found that some of the factors that can indicate whether someone will be more addicted to a video game include, but are not limited to, level of boredom, and the level of sensation seeking. Kids that tend to be bored more often, and get bored easy, will have tendencies to become addicted to video games. World of Warcraft is a game that is never ending, therefore, can argued that it will never get boring.

Works Cited

Huang, Der-Hsiang. "Video Game Addiction in Children and Teenagers in Taiwan." Cyber Psychology & Behavior 7.5 (2004).
Johnson, Jessi. "WoW Detox." 2009. <http://www.wowdetox.com/index.php>.

Ransom-Wiley, James. "WoW Surpasses 10 Million Subscribers, Now Half the Size of Australia." Jan 22nd 2008 <http://www.joystiq.com/2008/01/22/world-of-warcraft-surpasses-10-million-subscribers-now-half-the/>.

Young, Dr Kimberly. Center for Internet Addiction Recovery. 2009. <http://www.netaddiction.com/resources/online_gaming.htm>.