Parents should be vigilant for game-addicted children, warns doctor

By THE NATION

 

File photo

 

COMPUTER GAME addiction is a mental health disorder, a doctor at Bangkok’s Siriraj Hospital said yesterday, urging parents to monitor their children’s behaviour and ration their time spent in front of their screens so there is enough time for family bonding activities.

 

During a seminar hosted by the hospital on “healthy gamers”, Dr Charnvit Pornnoppadol, head of the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry of Mahidol University’s Faculty of Medicine at Siriraj Hospital, said, “Children and youths playing video/computer games are divided into four groups – those playing game to de-stress; those playing games for fun during their free time; those playing games as a social activity, interacting with friends, and those playing games to release frustration or escape from problems.”

 

The first two groups were not suffering from game addiction, he said, because they can quit it easily. The last two, however, would have difficulty giving up, especially those who moved into the virtual world to escape their real lives.

 

Addiction to video/computer games has been recognised by the World Health Organisation as a mental health disorder, Charnvit said. It is defined by a pattern of persistent or recurrent behaviour that has become so all-pervasive that it has taken precedence over all other activities. 

 

Full story: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30369395

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2019-05-15

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Why is addiction only focused on children; look at Thai adults they are the role models. Hopeless.

So often I see in restaurants parents giving their kid an iPad or phone while they play on their own phone. The eating part seems secondary to staring at a screen. 

 

I'm similar to these parents in the way I can't be bothered to raise children properly. Big difference being I don't have any kids. I mean, what's the point in having kids if you're not going to invest your time into them?

4 hours ago, webfact said:

family bonding activities.

This is a myth about Thailand and the family.  Thai males, generally, don't give a toss about their off-spring both born and unborn.  Mothers are forced to take whatever occupation they can get, wherever, whilst their children are packed off to grandparents.  The boys are often spoiled rotten; the girls taught to respect their place at the bottom of the food chain.

Parental visits are few and far between.

Parents won't be "vigilant": too busy taking selfies and hitting "like" on other's selfies in electronic circle jerk

Let those kids be exposed to English content and international communities, online video games is the reason why learning English was painless for me as a child. I would not be surprised if a part of the kids are part of online communities or have friends expecting them to show up, you can't blame them to not want to quit.

 

On the topic of addiction as said by others those kids role models are not any better since they spend hours a day smoking, watching brain melting soap opera, browsing facebook for hours on end, buying lottery tickets like it's some kind of decent revenue stream.