CBT Treatment for Internet Gaming Disorder
For patients and families
In plain language
An automatic summary of structured registry data. It is an orientation aid, not a substitute for the official protocol or a physician assessment.
- What is being studied
- The protocol lists: CBT-treatment, Wait list control.
- Who it may be relevant to
- Registry conditions: Internet Gaming Disorder, Gaming Disorder. Basic parameters: from 16 years · All.
- What needs checking
- Age, condition and sex are only basic indicators. Prior treatment, laboratory values and other mandatory requirements appear in the eligibility criteria below.
- Where it takes place
- Sweden
- Next step
- Save the trial, show it to the treating physician, and confirm current recruitment with the study center. Costs, documents and travel →
Unsure about the terms? Read our patient guide →
Official title
Gaming Disorder- a Randomized Controlled Trial in a Clinical Setting
Overview
For most people, gaming is perceived as a positive activity. In some cases, however, gaming may turn into an addiction with consequences for the individual health, quality of life and everyday life. Today, there is a lack of evidence-based interventions to treat this condition, called Gaming Disorder (GD). This study will evaluate a new manual for treatment of GD, divided into a number of modules and based on cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). The study is designed as a randomized controlled trial (RCT) and will be conducted at a clinic specialized in the treatment of gambling and gaming addiction. Participants included in the study will be randomized to one of to groups. The intervention group will receive twelve weeks of individual CBT-treatment while participants allocated to the control group will be put on a twelve-week wait-list. The hypothesis is that the manual based CBT treatment will result in a greater reduction in symptoms of criteria for GD.
Detailed description
The study is designed as a two-armed randomized controlled trial. After inclusion, every participant will be offered an overview of the participant´s psychosocial circumstances. Thereafter, the participants will be randomized to one of the two arms.
The main arm includes individual CBT treatment following a module-based manual. The manual includes nine main modules and three optional modules addressing different dimensions of gaming disorder, for example thoughts, emotions, and procrastination. Between every session the participants are working with home assignments, in order to strengthen helpful behaviours. The participants also report amount of time spent on gaming and other activities every week.
Participants randomized to the control arm also report their time spent on gaming and other activities every week.The wait-list control has the same duration as the CBT-arm. After the control-period, participants in the control arm will be offered the same treatment as participants in the intervention arm.
Interventions
- Behavioral CBT-treatment
Cognitive Behavioral Treatment for Gaming Disorder. - Behavioral Wait list control
No intervention
Primary outcome measures
- Internet Gaming Disorder Scale- Short Form (IGDS9-SF) [Time frame: Up to 24 weeks.]
Secondary outcome measures (2)
- Timeline follow back for gaming (TLFB-GD) [Time frame: Up to 12 weeks.]
- Gaming Disorder Test (GDT) [Time frame: Up to 24 weeks.]
Eligibility criteria
Inclusion criteria
- Fulfilling 5 out of 9 criteria for IGD according to DSM V
- ≥ 16 years of age
- Can read and speak Swedish fluidly.
Exclusion criteria
- Somatic or psychiatric disease that is contraindicating or severely complicates the implementation of the intervention (e.g., ongoing psychotic, manic or hypomanic episode or neuropsychiatric condition with severe disability)
- Ongoing increased suicide risk that is considered to make it inappropriate for the patient to participate in the study (based on evaluation at the structured clinical interview)
- have another ongoing psychological treatment with a content similar to that in the current study
- plan to start such treatment during the XX weeks that the study is ongoing or has during the last three weeks started or changed medication for any psychiatric problem.
Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.
Healthy volunteers: No
Study design
- Allocation
- Randomized
- Model
- Parallel assignment
- Masking
- Open label
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
Study locations
Sweden · 1 center
- Clinic for gambling addiction and screen health — Gothenburg
Publications
- Arvidson E, Hofstedt A, Soderpalm Gordh A. A flexible module-based cognitive behavioral therapy for gaming disorder: study protocol of a randomized controlled trial. Trials. 2025 Oct 2;26(1):386. doi: 10.1186/s13063-025-09147-4. PMID 41039577
- Hofstedt A, Mide M, Arvidson E, Ljung S, Mattiasson J, Lindskog A, Soderpalm-Gordh A. Pilot data findings from the Gothenburg treatment for gaming disorder: a cognitive behavioral treatment manual. Front Psychiatry. 2023 Jun 6;14:1162492. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1162492. eCollection 2023. PMID 37346899
Identifiers
NCT: NCT05328596 · MSS 2022-IGD RCT