Internet Addiction, Chat Room Overuse, and Other Online Problems

Chatting with friends is just one of the amazing communication tools the Web provides. Where else can you have instantaneous communication with multiple people all in real time? As fun as chatting online is, and as popular as this pastime has become, there are some people who have developed problems controlling the amount of time they spend in chat rooms or on instant messaging programs. Thus, much debate and research has been devoted to answering the question - are Internet addiction, chat room overuse, and other online usage issues serious problems?

The answer to this question is very complex and not entirely definitive. Internet addiction, chat room overuse, and other Web concerns have been found by researchers to have causes and effects that are very similar to other addictions, such as gambling. However, they have yet to earn actual classification as addictions by the American Medical Association. This does not minimize the potentially serious consequences that these problems can cause, however, especially in young children that are still developing.

As a parent of a child who loves chatting with his or her best friends online, what steps can you take to avoid Internet addiction, chat room overuse, and other Web-related problems? Your doctor is a great resource for help, of course, but the Mikko Que can also provide you with powerful tools to monitor and manage your child's screen time on the Internet, as well as the TV, video games, and other household devices.

With the Mikko Que you can reduce the use of electronic devices, and potentially avoid Internet addiction, chat room overuse, and more, by decreasing your child's time allowance over a period of time.  For example, in a given month you might allow your child 10 hours a day of use. Then, you can reduce usage to eight hours a day the next month and so on until your child's media consumption is more in line with recommended standards. This technique is less obtrusive and will result in less resistance.  It will also give parents the peace of mind that during sleeping hours their children are not up watching TV, playing video games, or surfing the Internet.

To learn more about the Mikko Que, how it can help you create an effective, healthy media management system in your home, and how it can help prevent Internet addiction, chat room overuse, and other online issues from forming, contact us today.

Media Management for Children ... It's time.