Gen Z Youth in the Battleground: Can AI Interventions Mitigate Risky Gaming Behaviours and Mental Health Harm?

Excessive gaming (EG) is increasingly recognised as a modifiable behavioural risk among youth, with potential implications for mental health and well-being in digitally mediated environments. This study examines excessive gaming as a behavioural exposure and AI cyber-shielding (AI-CS) as a perceived digital protective factor among Generation Z university gamers. AI-CS is conceptualised as users' perceived exposure to AI-enabled safety mechanisms embedded in gaming-related digital environments. The study investigates the associations of EG and AI-CS with four psychological outcomes: depressive symptoms (DEP), anxiety symptoms (ANX), hostile behaviours (HB), and personal well-being (PWB). Data were collected through a cross-sectional online survey of 983 university students aged 18 to 22 years from multicultural Middle Eastern backgrounds enrolled in Saudi universities. The sample included 54.2% males and 45.8% females. The proposed relationships were analysed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM). The results show that excessive gaming is positively associated with depressive and anxiety symptoms and negatively associated with personal well-being. No significant association was found between excessive gaming and hostile behaviours. AI cyber-shielding is negatively associated with depressive and anxiety symptoms and positively associated with personal well-being, but it does not significantly predict hostile behaviours. These findings indicate that excessive gaming is primarily associated with internal psychological outcomes rather than external behavioural responses. They also suggest that perceived AI-enabled safety affordances in gaming-related digital environments are associated with lower psychological distress and higher well-being. The study contributes to research on digital well-being by introducing and empirically examining AI cyber-shielding as a perception-based environmental factor associated with psychological functioning among university students.