AUTHOR=Zhang Yifen , Lin Xiao , Zhou Hongli , Xu Jiaojing , Du Xiaoxia , Dong Guangheng 

TITLE=Brain Activity toward Gaming-Related Cues in Internet Gaming Disorder during an Addiction Stroop Task

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=7

YEAR=2016

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00714

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00714

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=<p><bold>Background and Aims:</bold> Attentional bias for drug-related stimuli is a key characteristic for drug addiction. Characterizing the relationship between attentional bias and brain reactivity to Internet gaming-related stimuli may help in identifying the neural substrates that critical to Internet gaming disorder (IGD).</p><p><bold>Methods:</bold> 19 IGD and 21 healthy control (HC) subjects were scanned with functional magnetic resonance imaging while they were performing an addiction Stroop task.</p><p><bold>Results:</bold> Compared with HC group, IGD subjects showed higher activations when facing Internet gaming-related stimuli in regions including the inferior parietal lobule, the middle occipital gyrus and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. These brain areas were thought to be involved in selective attention, visual processing, working memory and cognitive control.</p><p><bold>Discussion and Conclusions:</bold> The results demonstrated that compared with HC group, IGD subjects show impairment in both visual and cognitive control ability while dealing with gaming-related words. This finding might be helpful in understanding the underlying neural basis of IGD.</p>