The Prevalence of Internet Gaming Disorder Among Medical Students at Umm Al-Qura University (UQU), Saudi Arabia: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background and Aims: Internet gaming disorder (IGD) is a worldwide psychological illness that can cause substantial suffering and impairment of gamers’ mental and physical health. Our study aimed to investigate the prevalence of IGD as well as the correlations between this disorder and gender, age and GPA among medical students at Umm Al-Qura University (UQU), Saudi Arabia. Methods: This was a comparative cross-sectional study conducted through an online survey between August 2022 and December 2022. The questionnaire was administered to male and female students across all years attending the Faculty of Medicine at Umm Al-Qura University, Saudi Arabia. Results: The sample included 351 responses from medical students, more than half of them male (58.1%). In our study, 14.5% of the participants had IGD, while 44% of people were at risk of getting this illness. There was a significant association between IGD and gender, with the male participants having twice as high a risk of developing it as the females. Conclusions: This study’s findings show that medical students have a high rate of IGD, which has a significant relationship with gender, four times higher in males than in females. However, IGD did not significantly correlate with GPA or age. It is necessary to conduct more research on the topic of psychological distress of medical students with IGD.