WHEN DOES ONLINE GAMING BECOME A HEALTH ISSUE?

How to reduce your family’s screen time

■ Conduct an audit to establish just how many hours per week screen time each family member has ■ Talk and agree as a family on what is an acceptable amount ■ Put it in writing and display the agreement somewhere prominent ■ Lead by example. Remember your phone has a screen!

What happened to the garden?

The average 5 to 18-year old in Australia spends between two and three hours a day looking at screens for recreation.

Gaming disorder

For gaming disorder to be diagnosed, the behaviour pattern must be of sufficient severity to result in significant impairment in personal, family, social, educational, occupational or other important areas of functioning and would normally have been evident for at least 12 months.

Signs to watch out for

■ Changes in mood and increased irritability ■ Difficulty sleeping ■ Loss of appetite ■ Lack of energy ■ Reduced social circle

■ saferinternet.org.uk ■ apa.org/about/policy/violent-video-games.aspx ■ lifewire.com/internet-parental-controls-2487974 ■ esafety.gov.au/education-resources/iparent ■ who.int/features/qa/gaming-disorder ■ health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/content/healthpubhlth-strateg-phys-act-guidelines

When does ONLINE GAMING ONLINE GAMING

BY SIMON HARDING Become a health issue?

As if it wasn’t hard enough conversing with a pre-occupied teenager, they’re now gaming with headsets on. And they seem to be just waiting for every opportunity to return to the virtual world. You can sense that the game is always there, whirling around in their mind, trying to lure them back.

Parents across the world are fighting the same battle with their children, with varying levels of success. And it looks like a war that, ultimately, the younger generation will win. Already, the average screen time each day of children aged five to eighteen exceeds the two hours per day that the Health Department recommends in its National Physical Activity Guidelines. And that average must surely conceal a number of children for whom screen time has become the main pass time.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) is concerned about these extremes. In the 11th Revision of its International Classification of Diseases, it plans to include ‘Gaming Disorder’, which is effectively an addiction to video games, where the need to play has taken priority over day-to-day life and leads to negative consequences. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM5) considers it a disorder requiring further research, and lays out nine criteria, of which five must be met within one year.

It is possible for gaming to be used as a tool of avoidance, a fantasy world in which a child—or adult for that matter— can escape the troubles they face each day in reality. When you consider that gamers are very particular in their choices of online identities and avatars, it makes sense. Essentially, they are offering the best possible version of themselves to the outside world.

Since the ‘90s, the American Psychological Association has been studying the effects of gaming and, in a 2015 paper, confirmed it had established a reliable link between exposure to violent video games, and aggressive behaviour in older children, adolescents and young adults. Which certainly should have us asking questions about the long-term impacts of gaming on society.

But what can we do as parents in the face of such pressure from our children? According to Rosemary Akers, a Psychologist at The Rockhampton Grammar School, the best place to start is to conduct an audit on the amount of screen time each member of the family is exposed to. There are tools available online, but a simple spreadsheet would suffice. Not only will the findings over a week give you a solid base for family dialogue, you’ll probably be surprised at the extent of your own screen time.

The next step is to discuss and agree among the family how much time is appropriate, and Rosemary recommends displaying this information somewhere prominent like the fridge, and then leading by example. After all, if your children see their parents online frequently when they themselves are not allowed, it makes the pill all the harder to swallow. So, if you’ve decided that phones should not be allowed at the dinner table, don’t sit there checking Facebook while you chew! It sends mixed messages to your children.

Of course, even with collective family agreement about the amount of screen time, there will be a temptation to break those rules and, particularly in the case of teenagers, their knowledge of media tends to be far greater than yours. That means parental controls are usually easy to switch off, so you’ll have to try and work with your child, not against them. But remember, if the need arises, there remains one simple solution to the issue of online screen time. To limit the hours in the day in which the wireless router is switched on and available.

The good news is that even gaming companies themselves are starting to take responsibility for the amount of time children are spending playing their games. Chinese firm, TenCent, has recently installed a one hour time limiter on its games for anyone who is under 12. This is in stark contrast to most free online games that give greater rewards to the players who spend the most time on the game.

In summary, while Gaming Disorder represents the extreme end of the spectrum, there is little question that restricting the amount of screen time would be of benefit to the entire family. And if your child is spending time playing video games, watch out for the telltale signs that something is wrong.