A social enterprise providing education and information to protect and enhance the mental health of young people
Boys who regularly play video games are more than twice as likely to have emotional and behavioural problems in childhood, but girls aren't similarly affected. This is one of the findings from the first large population-based study to show clear links between mental health and the amount of time spent using TV, video games and [...]
Flickr Images It was nearing midnight when she slipped out of bed, padded across the wood floors and peered into the room across the hall. Her 15-year-old son was still awake, like she knew he would be, sitting in his bed, staring at his laptop screen. This had long been his nightly ritual: [...]
Flickr Images We keep our kids safe from stranger danger, and the dangers of alcohol and drug abuse. We understand, in part from our own experience, the inherent risks. Who has not felt relief that the kids were indoors in front of the computer screen, or plugged into their smartphone instead of out [...]
Flickr Images Danny Izquierdo, a 22-year-old who lives with his parents in Silver Spring, Md., has found little satisfaction in a series of part-time, low-wage jobs he’s held since earning an associate degree from Brooklyn College. But the video games he plays, including “FIFA 16” and “Rocket League” on PlayStation and Pokémon Go [...]
Pixabay Images Leading American Psychologist Philip Zimbardo recently discussed how men are getting left behind. For the first time in history young men are less educated than their fathers. The American Paediatric Society's 2013 study found that teenagers spend more time engrossed in media than they do in school and that time on [...]
Pixabay Images Thousands of Australian teenagers may find their favourite shoot 'em up video games redefined as illegal gambling sites under a bill to be introduced by Independent Senator Nick Xenophon when Federal Parliament resumes in August. Children are being groomed for gambling through hugely popular multiplayer first-person shooter games such as Counter-Strike:Global [...]
Pixabay Images Pokémon GO is only days old, but already it’s a monster success. It’s all over the news and social feeds, crashed servers here in Australia and compelled millions of big and little kids world-wide to hit the streets to chase colourful creatures that don’t really exist. Yeah great, you say, but [...]
Getty Images One of the most common questions I get asked by parents about gaming addiction is ‘How can I tell if my child has a problem?’ While there are well documented physical, behavioural and psychological symptoms of gaming addiction, the risk of reading through these checklists is that parents can sometimes become unnecessarily worried about fairly normal [...]
Flickr/Renata Vaz I recently conducted a parenting night at Trinity Grammar School in Kew, Melbourne about Boys and Gaming. More than 450 parents turned up to find answers to the challenge of getting their boys off their devices. A parent shared with me the following: “My son is actually scaring me. I can’t even [...]
An online controversy over women and computer games has turned into an internet firestorm called Gamergate. Photo: Jason DeCrow The first rule of Gamergate is that nobody talks about Gamergate. Not unless you want a horde of vicious man-babies coming at you. The second rule of Gamergate is that if you're reading this [...]
