Case: Xiaoqiang is 9 years old, addicted to mobile games and does not want to go to school. His parents are busy with work and rarely communicate with him. The most common thing his parents say to Xiaoqiang is what he learned today? Have you written your homework? Moreover, when

Case: Xiaoqiang is 9 years old, addicted to mobile games and does not want to go to school. His parents are busy with work and rarely communicate with him. The most common thing his parents say to Xiaoqiang is what they learned today? Have you written your homework? Moreover, when asking these questions, parents are often absent-minded and ask while staring at their phones.

Xiaoqiang was not obsessed with mobile phones at first like he is now. He used to play basketball in basketball classes and went to make-up classes on weekends. Later, his parents found that he became more and more withdrawn and unwilling to leave the room, and began to think that the child might have grown up and began to have his own secrets.

One day, the teacher called Xiaoqiang's mother and said that he had not completed his homework for a week. His parents began to pay attention to Xiaoqiang and found that Xiaoqiang often played games at night until he fell asleep in bed. When he woke up the next day, he must look for his cell phone first and then get up.

For this reason, parents wanted to confiscate their mobile phones. Xiaoqiang was unwilling to do so. After discovering the strong conflict, Xiaoqiang threatened his parents for not going to school. His parents didn't know how to resolve it, so they thought of psychological counseling.

Xiaoqiang's mother's first words when she saw me were: "My child is addicted to the Internet, what should we do?" Xiaoqiang looked at the anxious mother indifferently, with anger on his face. During the consultation process, he began to be very resistant, either saying that he didn't know, or that you asked my mother. When he mentioned the " Minecraft " he played, he began to talk endlessly.

Internet addiction has always been controversial. In May 2013, the American Psychological Association introduced the term Internet use disorder to the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Diseases" for the first time, and noted that further research is needed in this field. This manual is the standard for psychologists to diagnose mental health disorders or illnesses. Therefore, rather than saying that a child is addicted to the Internet, it is better to think that the child has bad behavior in this matter and needs intervention.

In which case, does it mean that there is a problem with the child’s behavior and needs intervention? In my opinion, parents can make a rough judgment through five aspects:

1. Parents’ own feelings, do you feel that their children are addicted to mobile phones, and their parents eliminate their anxiety, while their children are talking about playing with mobile phones all day long. They are talking about short videos or games when chatting with you. We have to suspect that they may be dependent on mobile phones.

2. Observe whether the child is angry or anxious when we want to leave the phone. Once a child is forced to leave his cell phone, he begins to become restless, has no interest, and does not want to do anything, which means he may be dependent on his cell phone.

3. Mobile phones are their only focus on talking, playing and behaviour. He either plays with his phone or talks to you about what he plays with, and is ready to pick up his phone and continue playing. When you take him out, he is restless and always wants to go home to play with his cell phone.

4. Children always hide their phones so that you can't find them. They play with their phones secretly whenever they have time, and try to avoid playing with their phones. You will lie to you after playing, saying that you didn’t play.

5. Children often feel tired, irritable, and even self-isolate. They stop doing exercises they like before, stop playing with toys they like, and do not go out to find friends.

Once the child encounters any of the above situations, it means that the child is too dependent on the mobile phone, and parents need to regulate the situation of their children using the mobile phone.

Why do children become so addicted to mobile games

. Age factors

9-year-old children are in school age. The main development task for the first stage of children is to gain a sense of diligence and overcome inferiority complex . This stage is the development period for children to have confidence, self-control and resistance to frustration. During this period, if the child can learn diligently and get good grades and be recognized by his peers, teachers and parents, then his sense of diligence will be satisfied.

But if he cannot get recognition from his peers, parents, especially teachers in his studies, the child will question his diligence. He will think that diligence is useless to him, and will give up his pursuit of diligence and become inferior.At this time, the Internet gave him additional confidence, so he would hide in his mobile phone.

itself is in the developmental stage of the brain at this age, the self-management part has not yet been developed, and the cognitive learning ability is developing rapidly, so it is easy to be attracted and tempted by mobile phones and lose control.

. Psychological factors

Things that interest children on mobile phones, such as games and videos, are set according to the characteristics of human addiction, so once a child comes into contact with a mobile phone, he is easily attracted, and the harm of the mobile phone is not immediate.

We can think about it. We know that if a child eats too much sugar, we may not give his child a lot of sugar at once. But mobile phones are like the candy that children like to eat. We control the sugar in reality, but we often take mobile phones lightly and think it doesn’t matter if they play. As a result, the more children play, the more they like it. In addition, some people even use mobile phones to help them see their children. We just give the children a lot of candy, but ignore them. Naturally, it is easy to become addicted to the Internet and rely on mobile phones.

, Family Relations

will introduce you to an experiment with the purpose of studying addiction - the Rat Park Experiment.

In this experiment, a group of rats lived in a large cage with plenty of food and toys, and many mice acted as playmates and spouses. So the place where they live is called Rat Park. , another group of rats were locked in small cages alone. Both groups of rats were free to choose to drink water from two water bottles, one filled with tap water and the other filled with a solution containing morphine. The researchers found that rats living alone in small cages consumed significantly more morphine solutions than rats in rat parks—the former was 19 times more than the latter. Rats in the rat park always reject morphine solution and choose pure water .

Is there such a clear difference in the formation of addiction in the living environment? Then they did another set of experiments. The rats were first kept in a cage and only morphine solution was provided for 57 consecutive days. However, once these rats moved to the rat park, they would soon automatically withdraw and only choose pure water. None of the rats in the rat park had symptoms of addiction. Based on this experiment, the research team concluded that the living environment of addicts is one of the reasons for their addiction.

Family is the earliest environment for children to grow up. If children have problems, the family often has problems. If we want our children to stay away from the Internet and change their addiction state, the first thing we need to change is the family environment and parent-child relationship.

Imagine that when a family, parents are all bow-headed people, or busy people have no time to pay attention to their children. Children will soon imitate their parents' behavior, indulge in mobile phones, and not care about their families. At this time, it was not because the children became addicted to the Internet because the game was fun, but because they felt too bad in real life, so they went to the mobile game for comfort. The more children feel bad and socially isolated from their families, the more they will escape to the Internet until the Internet takes up more and more time for them and parents realize that their children are addicted to mobile games.

In fact, instead of saying that mobile phones or games harm children, it is better to reflect on how parents should get along with their children and how to improve family relationships in life. You should know that people who live a fulfilling, rewarding, meaningful life are almost impossible to be addicted to or fascinated by anything.

How to solve the problem:

. Setting the mobile phone family usage specifications

The reason why mobile phone family usage specifications is set is because parents' behaviors have a significant impact on the children during the education process.

The child’s current abilities are indeed average and he cannot resist his parents. But when the child sees his parents watching but tells him that you cannot watch, what does the child feel in his heart?

Children will think this is a very happy and happy thing, but they can only do this by their parents and I can’t do it. What do they think in their hearts?

So what we need to set is not just the child’s mobile phone usage specifications, but first set a mobile phone home usage specification.Let the phone return to the communication function, rather than a universal toy that you can't give up for a moment.

You are not playing with your phone anymore. If you read books, will your child still need to look at your phone?

So first create a mobile phone storage area for your phone at home. After returning home, put your phone in this place. When you can, try not to move your phone, chat with your children at home, play games, and guide your children's attention from the virtual world and back to the real world.

has a mobile phone storage area, and after ensuring that the child does not bring the mobile phone to the bedroom, we also need to set a mobile phone usage time for the child. During this period, it is unlikely to completely break off from the mobile phone, so we can set a time period for our children.

How many minutes can children play with their mobile phones every day, where to play, and what to play, this is what parents need to formulate with their children. You must never let your child take his cell phone back to the bedroom to play with his own.

You should know that in this online world, all kinds of information will appear, and a 9-year-old child does not have the ability to distinguish for the time being, and cannot know what is good, useful, and those are inappropriate and bad. So try to let the child play with his mobile phone in an open area and be clear about what the child is playing.

For mobile phone use, the formulated mobile phone usage rules must be strictly followed. Once the child does not abide by the rules, parents need to cancel the child's right to use the mobile phone, and the child can only use the mobile phone again after the punishment is implemented as agreed.

. Parents and children change

Some of the children use mobile phones because parents regard mobile phones as a tool to coax children. So when changing, we need parents to change them. You only confiscate your child's mobile phone, but do not tell your child what the child can do in this spare time. The child will not immediately devote his mind to learning, but will instead experience the withdrawal reaction of the mobile phone .

At this time, as parents, we can arrange more activities, take our children to do small scientific experiments, read books and recite poems together, and do housework together. You can also set up some small family activities, such as little scientists and little writers, to help children gain confidence and interest in participating through competitive games. We can also take our children to exercise, play ball, and run together to help them strengthen their bodies. Through abundant activities, children's attention is introduced from their mobile phones to real life.

It is relatively easier for a nine-year-old child to pull back from the world of mobile phones to reality, because he does not have too strong resistance. If the child has reached adolescence, then what we do is not just to attract the child back to the real world through interest.

If your child is in adolescence and is addicted to mobile phones, the rules are similar, but there is a fight of wits and courage, it will not be that simple. You need to preset the child's response to resistance behavior and only after actual drills can it be implemented.

I am Zhang Li, a psychological counselor. If your child is tired of school, is anxious, and is depressed, and pays attention to me, there are more practical methods to shout on the way to come!