Youth And Internet Addiction In China

A form of 'electronic opium' is how some people have characterised young people’s internet use in China. The problem of 'internet addiction' (wangyin) is seen by some parents as so severe that they have sought psychiatric help for their children. This book, which is based on extensive original research, including discussions with psychiatrists, parents and 'internet-addicted' young people, explores the conflicting attitudes which this issue reveals. It contrasts the views of young people who see internet use, especially gaming, as a welcome escape from the dehumanising pressures of contemporary Chinese life, with the approach of those such as their parents, who medicalise internet overuse and insist that working hard for good school grades is the correct way to progress. The author shows that these contrasting attitudes lead to battles which are often fierce and violent, and argues that the greater problem may in fact lie with parents and other authority figures, who misguidedly apply high pressure to enforce young people to conform to the empty values of a modern, dehumanised consumer-oriented society.

Focusing on the two essential factors of the construction of risk, this book presents research revolving around the staging of and the coping with Internet addiction in China. Using ethnographic methods, it investigates the signs and treatment of Internet addiction and discusses the in-patient approaches used to help children overcome the addiction and to reduce the likelihood of relapse following discharge. Examining the individual level and broader social levels of the process as well as the links between the two, the findings provide valuable insights into the prevention and treatment of Internet addiction. To help readers better understand the signs of Internet addiction and preventive measures, the book addresses the following issues: Public concern and media coverage of Internet addiction in contemporary China Clinical assessment and risk factors of Internet addiction in adolescents Parent-narrated signs of Internet addiction in Chinese children and adolescents Coping strategies and treatments for Internet addiction.--

Social media such as instant messaging (IM), social networking sites (SNS), blogs and microblogs are an integral part of adolescents’ lives in China. Anecdotal evidence reported in the news has suggested that the increasing popularity of social media could make adolescents more vulnerable to being addicted. This exploratory study proposes the concept of “social media addiction” and examines (a) whether social media addiction exists among adolescents in urban China and, if so, who the addicts are, what their symptoms are and to what extent they are addicted; (b) whether sociopsychological traits (e.g., need for affiliation, impression management, narcissism and leisure boredom) can predict social media addiction among adolescents; (c) what gratifications are obtained by adolescents from their use of social media and whether these gratifications can predict social media addiction and (d) to what degree social media addiction influences adolescents’ academic performance and social capital. This study employed quantitative questionnaire surveys among adolescents as the main research method, supplemented by qualitative pre-survey focus groups among adolescents and post-survey in-depth interviews among parents and teachers. Questionnaire surveys were conducted based on a multi-stage cluster sampling of seven middle schools in five urban Chinese cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Xiamen. The final sample consisted of 1,549 adolescents, of whom 90% had used social media. Using Young’s classic definition of Internet addiction, 15.6% of participants were classified as social media addicts. The addicted adolescents were often self-absorbed, bored with their leisure time, and good at using manipulation through social media for impression management. Addicts experienced four major social media addiction symptoms: preoccupation, adverse consequences, alleviation of negative emotions and loss of interest in social activities. The seven social media gratifications identified in this study can be categorized into social, information and entertainment gratifications. Among these, entertainment gratifications had the most power to predict social media addiction, while information gratifications were the least likely to lead to addiction. Furthermore, these gratifications were found to be powerful mediators between the adolescents’ sociopsychological traits and social media addiction. Finally, the results also indicated that social media addiction and its symptoms had a significant negative impact on adolescents’ academic performance and social capital.

Focusing on the two essential factors of the construction of risk, this book presents research revolving around the staging of and the coping with Internet addiction in China. Using ethnographic methods, it investigates the signs and treatment of Internet addiction and discusses the in-patient approaches used to help children overcome the addiction and to reduce the likelihood of relapse following discharge. Examining the individual level and broader social levels of the process as well as the links between the two, the findings provide valuable insights into the prevention and treatment of Internet addiction. To help readers better understand the signs of Internet addiction and preventive measures, the book addresses the following issues:Public concern and media coverage of Internet addiction in contemporary ChinaClinical assessment and risk factors of Internet addiction in adolescentsParent-narrated signs of Internet addiction in Chinese children and adolescentsCoping strategies and treatments for Internet addiction

Fengshu Liu situates the lives of Chinese youth and the growth of the Internet against the backdrop of rapid and profound social transformation in China. In 2008, the total of Internet users in China had reached 253 million (in comparison with 22.5 million in 2001). Yet, despite rapid growth, the Internet in China is so far a predominantly urban-youth phenomenon, with young people under thirty (especially those under twenty-four), mostly members of the only-child generation, as the main group of the netizens’ population. As both youth and the Internet hold the potential to inflict, or at least contribute to, far-reaching economic, social, cultural, and political changes, this book fulfills a pressing need for a systematical investigation of how youth and the Internet are interacting with each other in a Chinese context. In so doing, Liu sheds light on what it means to be a Chinese today, how ‘Chineseness’ may be (re)constructed in the Internet Age, and what the implications of the emerging form of identity are for contemporary and future Chinese societies as well as the world.

In this book, Marcella Szablewicz traces what she calls the topography of digital game culture in urban China, drawing our attention to discourse and affect as they shape the popular imaginary surrounding digital games. Szablewicz argues that games are not mere sites of escape from Real Life, but rather locations around which dominant notions about failure, success, and socioeconomic mobility are actively processed and challenged. Covering a range of issues including nostalgia for Internet cafés as sites of youth sociality, the media-driven Internet addiction moral panic, the professionalization of e-sports, and the rise of the self-proclaimed loser (diaosi), Mapping Digital Game Culture in China uses games as a lens onto youth culture and the politics of everyday life in contemporary China. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2009 and 2015 and first-hand observations spanning over two decades, the book is also a social history of urban China’s shifting technological landscape.

Addiction is a powerful and destructive condition impacting large portions of the population around the world. While typically associated with substances, such as drugs and alcohol, technology and internet addiction have become a concern in recent years as technology use has become ubiquitous. Psychological, Social, and Cultural Aspects of Internet Addiction is a critical scholarly resource that sheds light on the relationship between psycho-social variables and internet addiction. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as human-computer interaction, academic performance, and online behavior, this book is geared towards psychologists, counselors, graduate-level students, and researchers studying psychology and technology use.

Adolescent developmental issues are growing globally; studies show that the percentage of adolescent mental health issues such as depression and suicide continues to escalate. Adolescent addiction problems such as substance abuse, pathological gambling and Internet addiction are intensifying. Furthermore, interpersonal problems such as violence and bullying have grown in different forms, particularly in view of the growing development of social media such as Facebook. In many studies, it was estimated that around one-fifth of adolescents may require professional help because of their psychosocial problems. In this book, the authors present the first known scientific study on the psychosocial development in Chinese adolescents in Hong Kong. A large sample was used and validated measures of positive youth development, family functioning, parent-child relational processes and adolescent risk behavior were included in the study