My ears have been pinned back

I have been side tracked today, outside of my regular newspaper work, by reading and studying more about reports about extreme increases in gaming usage and gaming addiction due to COVID-19 lock downs.

The Epoch Times newspaper published a story today with the headline "Pandemic Lockdowns Fueled Massive Rise in Gaming and Addiction, Experts Say" that is extremely disturbing. I know next to nothing about "gaming" other than it is a supreme waste of time if you don't keep your gaming time to a reasonably low level.

This part of the story pinned my ears back:
The gaming features that make the most money were born in the casino. They are designed to be habit-forming.

“Gaming, like gambling, uses what’s called an intermittent reward schedule, which happens to be the most habit-forming kind,” said Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, who is a psychologist, digital addiction expert and award-winning author.

“This is the slot machine reward schedule. Slot machines wouldn’t be as habit-forming if you won every time.”

There's just too much in this story to wrap my head around right now. It's all very disturbing. I am deeply troubled by this. I wonder what factor gaming has on damaging the will of young girls and boys to take up activities such as athletics or Fine Arts. Beyond that, how many student-athletes waste their time gaming instead of improving their athletic skills and physical health? This is a very sad rabbit hole to go down.

I digress.