Highly Caffeinated Energy Drinks and Teenage Gaming Disorder
Gamers overconsume caffeine, leading to more gaming and sleep disorders.
Posted September 26, 2025 | Reviewed by Abigail Fagan
Excessive gaming for hours without breaks is a symptom of a behavioral problem and a coping strategy. Lonely, depressed adolescents often turn to gaming—offering connection, stimulation, and escape. Yet gaming may temporarily soothe distress, but also may worsen it, creating a cycle of plummeting mood and withdrawal from healthier social interaction. Large cross-sectional studies have consistently demonstrated that adolescents with high problematic gaming levels also report more depressive symptoms, loneliness , and social anxiety . One study found that high-problematic gamers had worse depressive mood, greater loneliness, and lower school performance than their peers. Many are also high consumers of high-dose caffeinated drinks.
Gaming—Not Just for Boys and Men
Prevalence estimates vary, but most studies place problematic gaming around 3–6% of adolescents worldwide, with higher rates in East Asia. According to U.S. data from the Entertainment Software Association, about 53 % of video game players identify as male and 46% identify as female, with 1% non-binary or “other/prefer not to say.” Even if participation is close to gender parity, other dimensions (time spent, type of games played) may still skew male.
Some researchers argue that males and females differ in game preferences, play motivations, or openness to risk-taking or aggressive game genres, which may lead to gendered participation patterns.
Gaming as Self-Medication
Gaming disorder must be separated from recreational or high-engagement gaming. These findings support a clinical reality that not all gaming is harmful, and gaming may buffer against isolation. It is more than a case of frequency or passion for gaming alone. What matters most for a GD diagnosis is the loss of control over gaming and harms. Consequently, a gamer may play a great deal without having a disorder.
Korean researchers recently demonstrated that low-risk gamers reported lower loneliness, suggesting moderate social gaming may provide a protective social connection. By contrast, high -risk gamers experienced elevated loneliness, reinforcing the idea that the line between healthy and harmful gaming lies not in whether adolescents play games, but instead, how long, how often they play, why, and what consequences. This became clear during the pandemic, when online multiplayer games provided adolescents meaningful social contact during lockdowns. For most people, gaming is entertainment that engages pleasure, risk, and reward drives. However, some individuals develop an addiction to gaming despite negative consequences.
Problematic Gaming Is A Behavioral Addiction
Marc Potenza, M.D., Ph.D, Steven M. Southwick Professor of Psychiatry and Professor in the Child Study Center of Neuroscience , frames “problematic gaming” (or “gaming disorder”/“ internet gaming disorder ”) as a behavioral addiction—type phenomenon, sharing key features with substance addictions and gambling, but applied to gaming.
Potenza emphasizes that problematic gaming is characterized by impaired control over gaming with unsuccessful attempts to reduce, control, or stop. Teens with gaming disorder (GD) increasingly prioritize gaming over family, friends, sports, school, or other interests/activities. Even with adverse outcomes, the individual continues gaming. Gaming disorder leads to clinically significant impairment in adolescent relationships, academic work, and health. The pattern persists over about 12 months versus a binge or short-lived excess.
A scientific paper by Yale's Dr. Jennifer Park, to be published soon, emphasizes the connection between adolescent gaming (especially heavy/disordered gaming) and consumption of highly caffeinated beverages. Peer behavior, marketing directed at gamers, parental habits or supervision (or none), influence how much caffeine adolescents use during gaming. Problematic consumption of stimulants or caffeine-filled beverages is linked to harm.
Potenza points toward cognitive, neurobiological, and personality traits that may lead to gaming disorder (GD), such as impulsivity and reward sensitivity. Someone with loneliness, depression , high reward sensitivity, and impulsivity might be more prone to both excessive gaming and excessive caffeine use—the same “brain wiring”. A new study by Dr. Maria Kryza-Lacombe showed that Individuals with GD have exaggerated brain pleasure responses during reward anticipation or a hyper-reactive reward system. In addition, diminished executive control or untreated ADHD may enhance vulnerability to GD.
Caffeine → Poor Sleep → Lower Inhibition → More Gaming
The marketing of energy drinks and other caffeinated products specifically targets gamers, with advertising about performance, alertness, and staying awake.
Several energy drink brands have positioned themselves firmly within the gaming community, sponsoring e-sports events, streamers, and online content. The most heavily marketed caffeine drinks to gamers include Red Bull, Monster, G Fuel, Bang Energy, Celsius, and Sneak Energy.
Some adolescents try to limit their caffeine (especially during sleep hours) or adjust gaming routines. However, this strategy often fails because caffeine and psychostimulants may improve persistence, duration, and gaming performance, and doing well on games is important to gamers. The gaming literature shows that excessive gaming and caffeine use affect sleep.
Intermediate Traits in Gaming Disorder
With behavioral addictions, researchers often look for intermediate traits (like impulsivity) that cut across addictive behaviors and lead to shared negative consequences. Cross-sectional and correlational studies repeatedly find that higher levels of problematic gaming are associated with greater depressive symptoms, higher loneliness, greater social anxiety , and lower self-esteem in adolescents. In a large adolescent research study, “high problematic gamers” scored higher on depressive mood, loneliness, social anxiety, negative self-esteem, and lower school performance compared to lower-risk gamers.
Gaming as a Gateway to Gambling?
Many games blend elements of entertainment gaming with monetized gambling-like systems. The digitization of gaming and gambling has accelerated its convergence. Adolescents today are more likely to encounter gambling not in a casino but embedded in a video game. The overlap between gaming and gambling further raises the possibility that gaming becomes a gateway to gambling.
Mechanics such as loot boxes, gacha systems, and “skin” gambling replicate core gambling principles, especially schedules similar to slot machines. Loot boxes and gacha draws entice players with randomized rewards purchasable with real/virtual currency. At the same time, skin gambling transforms cosmetic digital items into tradable assets with real-world value, often outside regulatory oversight. These systems normalize risk-taking and foster gambling-like engagement under the guise of gaming. While some countries (Belgium) regulate loot boxes as gambling, others (UK, US) remain lenient, leaving many adolescents exposed to these hidden gateways into gambling behavior.
Clinically, the GD harms—sleep deprivation, financial strain, depression, emotional distress, and behavioral addiction—mirror those of traditional gambling, even when not legally defined as such.
Many adolescents enjoy playing video games. Some spend excessive time gaming and develop a gaming disorder. There also seems to be a subtle segue leading gamers toward gambling, which may become an issue for people with a gaming disorder who could also develop a gambling disorder.
Kryza-Lacombe M, Abram SV, Potenza MN, Mackin RS, Lau KJ, Nicholas SC, Ford JM, Batki SL, Mathalon DH, Fryer SL. Larger Neural Responses to Reward in Gambling Disorder: Relationships with Depression and Gambling Severity. Biol Psychiatry Cogn Neurosci Neuroimaging. 2025 Jul 30:S2451-9022(25)00224-1. doi: 10.1016/j.bpsc.2025.07.008. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 40749749.
Dong, G., & Potenza, M. N. (2014). A cognitive-behavioral model of Internet gaming disorder: Theoretical underpinnings and clinical implications. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 58, 7–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpsychires.2014.07.005
Jung JY, Choi HM, Hong JP, Kim MH, Kim D, Park SH, Hahm BJ, An JH. Association of Game Use With Loneliness and Social Isolation: A Nationwide Korean Study. Psychiatry Investig. 2025 Jun;22(6):714-721. doi: 10.30773/pi.2023.0385. Epub 2025 Jun 16. PMID: 40566895; PMCID: PMC12198890.
King DL, Delfabbro PH, Billieux J, Potenza MN. Problematic online gaming and the COVID-19 pandemic. J Behav Addict. 2020;9:184–186. doi: 10.1556/2006.2020.00016.
Park K, Chang H, Hong JP, Kim MH, Park S, Jung JY, Kim D, Hahm BJ, An JH. The Effect of Time Spent on Online Gaming on Problematic Game Use in Male: Moderating Effects of Loneliness, Living Alone, and Household Size. Psychiatry Investig. 2024 Feb;21(2):181-190. doi: 10.30773/pi.2023.0027. Epub 2024 Feb 22. PMID: 38433417; PMCID: PMC10910165.
Vaccaro, A. G., & Potenza, M. N. (2019). Diagnostic and classification considerations regarding problematic gaming: Neurocognitive and neurobiological features. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 10, 405. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00405
Park, J.J., Zhao, Y., Potenza, M.N. Gaming disorder and problematic caffeine consumption in adolescents. Front. Psychol. Sec. Addictive Behaviors. Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1690304
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Mark S. Gold, M.D., is a pioneering researcher, professor, and chairman of psychiatry at Yale, the University of Florida, and Washington University in St Louis.
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