Association of commonly reported musculoskeletal pain with the ergonomic risk assessment of first-person shooter personal computer gamers: a cross-sectional pilot study

Abstract

Introduction: Few to no literature on ergonomic risk assessment focus on gamers and musculoskeletal pain. While there is evidence on the ergonomic risks in mobile gaming, console gaming, and exergaming, there is none particular for first-person shooter games where accuracy and speed of mouse movements are important. The objective of the study is to assess the ergonomic risk and identify its association to the commonly reported musculoskeletal pain of first-person shooter computer gamers. Methods: The Rapid Upper Limb Assessment was used to determine the ergonomic risk of 10 gamers using a single chosen frame from 30-minute videos taken while playing a first-person shooter game. The Nordic Musculoskeletal Questionnaire was used to identify commonly reported musculoskeletal pain. Fisher Exact Test was performed to quantify the relationship between these variables. Results: The level of musculoskeletal disorder risk resulted with 80-90% having medium risk and 10-20% having very high risk. Low back and neck pain are the most prevalent pain present in 60% and 50% of the participants respectively. No significant relationship was found between the variables with P values of 0.40 for the left view and 0.13 for the right view. Discussion: Other factors outside the scope of the study should also be considered such as pain external to gaming, duration of gaming hours, amount of rest periods, and participants’ age. The study provides a protocol that future studies may reference for gaming, specifically in an online setting. However, the relationship between ergonomic risk and commonly reported musculoskeletal pain is found to be statistically insignificant.