What to do when your child is addicted ...
In the beginning, when you first saw that big white F on the dark blue background on your child’s laptop you had no clue what this was about. You thought it would probably be another of those school assignments that require spending quite some time on computer and Face-something website was like Google maybe, full of information and a valuable source of knowledge.
It is over a month now that your kid is on Facebook non-stop. Every time you open the room door, the laptop is stuck on this page and your kid is lost in space. You did your research to see what Facebook is about; to understand what the big deal about this big white F on the dark blue background is. You read users’ reviews on the Internet, articles on magazines, and experts’ opinions on newspapers. Finally, you had to join Facebook to see for yourself, to have full control of the situation.
Joining Facebook; making the best out of it; reconnecting with old friends; staying in touch with dear people; using applications; supporting causes; entering forums; joining groups; playing games; chatting; negotiating; sharing knowledge; flirting; getting involved; more and more each day; more and more each minute; realizing the enormous impact of social networking on modern society; realizing your child is addicted to Facebook.
The signs are pretty clear.
- Obsessive log-ins: Children who are addicted to Facebook check their pages constantly to make sure they do not miss any live activity. Addicted children and Facebook users in general, have the need to update their status at a constant rate, every time something happens to them, every time they experience something in their real life. This is a sign of addiction.
- Isolation: Facebook addicts are isolated. If your child is constantly in front of a computer screen, interacting with online contacts rather than hanging out with real friends, talking over the phone or going out, then you are probably facing a real addiction problem in the family.
- Talking about Facebook all the time: If one out of two words are about Facebook, if your child is more excited about the new Facebook application than the school grades, if he/she freaks out if he/she cannot log on due to Internet connection problems, if anything he/she thinks, talks, breathes about is Facebook, then your child is clearly addicted.
There are probably more signs of Facebook addiction as each person is unique and children are too self-centered until they are fully developed to understand the real impact of their cyber addiction. Cyber bullying is mostly encountered at middle school age children and, apparently it continues until children become teenagers.
So, what can you do after you realize that you child is addicted to Facebook?
- Be involved: Like you did when you joined Facebook to see for yourself what it’s going on, getting involved in your children’s point of reference encourages them to grant you entrance in their magic cyber world. Children are always ahead in technology and most of the times, they feel bored with adults because they think we are ignorant and naïve when it comes to trying new things. So, show them you are ready to conquer the cyber world and become an active part of it. Encourage them to show you what they are doing and be ready to be surprised by their knowledge.
- Be a parent, not a friend: Most of the times, it’s difficult to keep a balance between sharing with your child and still instituting discipline. As a parent, you should insist on knowing the usernames and passwords of the accounts your child uses, not only on Facebook, but in all social networking websites. As a friend, you should instill trust in your children to convince them that you don’t ask for passwords to spy on them, but to protect them in case they are in any sort of danger.
- Make clear rules: Set limits in the amount of time that your child is allowed to use the Internet during the day. The rules must be enforced consistently and you should enforce punishment, in case they are broken.
- Make punishments: Your punishments should not result in severe consequences, but they should rather involve the mind of your child. If your child understands why he/she is punished and you explain your arguments reasonably, then your parent-child relationship is not undermined. In contrast, severe punishments, which most of the times seem unreasonable to a child, may put the quality of a parent-child relationship at stake.
For better or worse, today our children grow up in cyber playgrounds. There is not too much we can do to change this reality, except from trying to make sure that as they grow up, they learn to do more than moving a mouse around a keyboard and chatting with cyber friends.
I work as a financial and investment advisor but my passion is writing, music and photography. Writing mostly about finance, business and music, being an amateur photographer and a professional dj, I am inspired from life. Being a strong advocate of simplicity in life, I love my family, my partner and all the people that have stood by me with or without knowing. And I hope that someday, human nature will cease to be greedy and demanding realizing that the more we have the more we want and the more we satisfy our needs the more needs we create. And this is so needless after all. Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/what-to-do-when-your-child-is-addicted-to-facebook-1040962.html