They should save money on setting up a phone number and just have the trigger tone be a dial tone.

I wonder if this would work for video games. I could have certainly used any help I could get during my WoW addiction. (Don't worry, Blizzard eventually used virtual reality to cure it in the form of an eventually stale game.)

Interesting whats next research on escort servicing? Maybe what its like to be a Columbian drug lord :P. It is interesting though that many of universities are using games as a means of study now though.

I really don't see this working very well.

This does seem like it doesn't have high odds of working properly.

I would offer to help this guy... if he just let me use the rolled-up newspaper.

Interesting but I see this working with maybe 1 out of 100 addicts... maybe. I've been around these people before and it just ain't that simple.

This game sounds like fun. Now I have to go and get addicted to crack... again. How will they cure my gaming addiction, though?

I like the newspaper idea better.

Another thing...does "Therapist" really have to be spelled exactly like "The rapist"? It's not conducive to good skimming...

@notintheface34: @Jestek: no chance.

C'mon - how does this work - OMG I have a craving for crack...I should call that number! - No. It's like, OMG I want a crack! Let me give you anything you want for some...

I'm not trying to make light of this, I just don't think that this will aid people's lives, it is just another academic who wants to be published and get paid more. Roar. This is also along the same lines of thinking that tells someone that we interpret virtual worlds the same as real worlds (ie Jack Thompson). Guess what? We don't. At all. So get over it. Crackheads need to be stuck in a rehab facility for a long, long time and if they really don't want to do crack anymore they won't. If they do, they sure as hell are not going to call some phone number, let alone not put themselves in a situation to get it.

@Robotube: With the way things are these days, and me with my own cell phone, I haven't heard a dial tone in ages.

When I think about it, every time I read or think about Pavlov's experiments, I notice myself salivating. Hmm...

crack is SOOO overrated.

I wonder if this would work with videogame addicts. Seriously, how many of us can hear the startup music for Super Mario Brothers and thumbs start twitching?

I guess deconditioning would involve hearing my in-laws arrive the doorstep and I can't use my living room TV for gaming for the weekend.

I've seen people cured from their $2000 a day cocaine addiction by simply setting them up with an Everquest account. It's an effective and affordable substitute.

@captronj: Actually, on an HBO special about drug and alcohol addition, there was a study done on crack addicts. In this study, they watched the brain activity of addicts while exposing them to videos that had subliminal images meant to stimulate their craving. The images were so brief that addicts did not recall seeing them, yet the study showed increased brain activity in the part of the brain associated with drug cravings.

The point of the study was to show that drug cravings can be triggered by subconscious stimuli. Conversely, if the above article proves true, you could train the brain to associate a certain sound with the cessation of a craving. I used to think that someone just had to want to stop using drugs, but there is a lot more going on in the brain when it comes to addiction.

You'd be surprised that things like this can work. Not for everyone and not as directly as you say but there are benfits to simulations to help people with all kinds of problems.

My favourite game crack house was level 1 of The Punisher.

WOW The Sims have hit a all time low. hahahahahaha

Do the houses get raided and force players to scatter like roaches and hop over fences, ditching every piece of paraphernalia left on their bodies, rythmically dodging environmental hazards to the theme of COPS?

I'm interested how something like this would work, though. It doesn't seem to be eliminating the craving, or even gradually lessening the craving, but rather giving them a panic button whenever the cravings arise. It seems to me that rather than cutting back on the frequency of cravings, it's subsititing one addiction for another.

Though, obviously, listening to a tone on a cell phone is less harmful than crack abuse.

But where will they go when the crackheads become helplessly addicted to computer games? Will they need to put them back on the pipe?

I wonder if the rolled up newspaper technique would be useful in dealing with MMORPG addictions.

Either way it is very interesting. I always wondered what a good practical application of Pavlov's conditioning would look like.

I wonder when I can get some virtual meth and heroin too?

...and then, when the time is right, all of the conditioned ex-crackheads will get a call telling them to take up arms and do my bidding...

go, my minions! attack!

Not making light of their situation at all, but this sounds like a different experience. I need to play this game. :-)

/sigh...

I'm not sure how I feel about people being surprised by the fact that games can serve these types of purposes. We have self-help books/tapes, and the like, right? Why not self help games that reinforce behaviors?

I guess I just hate it when reporters act all confounded that videogames can help. Maybe I'd feel better if it wasn't considered a big deal but natural.

That's a nice change from the "games cause violence" debate that's always going around.

It seems to me the people who came up with this are probably high on something. I don't see this as a plausible working solution at all.

instead of using crack, play WoW! the newspaper roll is a lie!

@Robotube: That wouldn't work. While the sound would stop cravings for a while, the fact that they would hear it every time they picked up the phone might weaken the association with the cessation of cravings. Eventually they would hear it and be like, "hmm, I need to dial, some crack would be good about now."

An interesting approach, indeed, but how in the world is this going to work? Crack-addicts will love their powdery goodness and a video game ain't gonna tear them apart.

On day 25 of not having had a cigarette I can personally say that this game is one of the dumbest possible ideas ever conceived by any human being. No exceptions. If an alien species reads of this idea, we will be very lucky if they do not decide to snuff us from existence because of it.

If you've never been addicted to cocaine or nicotine (the two substances that most addiction researchers agree are the most addictive substances to the human brain), I truly don't think you have the capacity to understand it. It's sort of like you can never have your favorite food again. Oh, and you hear voices telling you that not eating your favorite food is really stupid. And all the people that don't want you to eat your favorite good are douchebags. And your wife/husband died. Yeah, see, you don't think it's really as bad as that, do you? Just trust me on this. It is. And for your own sake, don't even try anything containing nicotine. I can't speak from experience on cocaine, but I hear it is just as bad from an addiction aspect.

how great would this game be if you played it high on crack?

this concept reminds me of the time i kicked my PCP addiction by actually becoming a player in TRON and decisively (and barely) succeeding.
no...upon further reflection, i was just on PCP then, too.