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Brief Background of the Study The Internet has become a worldwide phenomenon used by children and adults for a variety of reasons. It is a convenient way of retrieving information and connecting with others. Unfortunately, some individuals, like students, develop an addiction to the Internet, which can be difficult to overcome. Addiction to the internet can be caused by: depression, compulsion, loneliness, or social disorder. We will be focusing on two internet features that get young adults addicted.
First of which is, social networking. Backbone and Twitter are woo of the most widely used social networking sites among high school students, and having accounts for these is a social trend. You rarely see a high school student that does NOT have an account for either of these sites. These sites provide recreation for students and connections between friends or families, and it lets them keep in touch with people from around the world. It also lets us keep track of other’s activities and express ourselves through status updates.
Sites like these were first seen as Just another medium, a delivery system, not a diabolical machine. But now, people made it more productive; that’s why people get so addicted. The second internet feature teenagers can’t seem to stop thinking about is online gaming. Boys mostly fall victims to this hobby, and it seems that it consumes much of their time and money. In most cases, teenage boys tend to make the computer shop, where the games they play are dominant, their own recreational sanctuary. So this kind of behavior tends to get in the way of their studies and their personal lives.
Parents have a real problem with this, since not all arenas are happy with the fact that their son/daughter spends most of his/ her free time playing in a virtual world rather than make their studies their first priority. So, what are the effects of this addiction on students and their studies? Social networking and gaming addiction can cause brain damage. It has abnormal white matter integrity in brain regions involving emotional generation and processing, executive attention, decision making and cognitive control.
Many parents blame the downfall of students on the internet and it causes many difficulties for the student in school. For social networking addicts, time always seems to move too fast for them because most don’t keep track of the time because of their excessive usage of the internet. Some would only be surprised that 2 hours have passed since they last checked what time it is. This results to poor time management skills, and procrastination among students. Some students tend to put social networking first, rather than do their homework, or even projects, which result to eleventh-hour submissions.
As for online gaming, there are some positive and negative effects on students. According to a study conducted by psychologists at the university of Alabama, there is a program called Faces and it is believed to develop the ability of children with autism spectrum disorders to recognize faces, facial expressions, and emotions. There are also some online games that can develop your learning skills and develop certain abilities like their logical and critical skills, and improve creativity and technical abilities. These are some of the positive effects.
A negative effect of computer gaming is lack of sleep, which brings an unwanted effect to the student after sleep. If ever a student makes this a daily habit, he might lose his eye focus memory relapse. They might even start hallucinating if ever the addiction is at a high level. Statements of the problem 1. What are the features of social networking and online games that addicted the gamers/users? 2. What are the causes of social networking and gaming addiction? 3. What are the effects of social networking and gaming addiction?
Significance of the study Students This study would help the students lessen their usage of the internet, or at least them be aware of some of its pros and cons. It has some tips and advice for them concerning their excessive internet usage. It would also inform them of some of the positive and negative effects of this addiction, some of the advantages and disadvantages. Parents Parents would benefit from this study because it can probably help their children lessen their internet usage, and focus on their studies. It could even help lessen their expenses on electricity and their children’s allowance for internet shops.
Teachers Because this addiction to gaming and social networking results to their poor mime management skills, students tend to submit projects and assignments at an overdue time, and teachers have a hard time grading them. So if this study can help the students manage their daily schedules, overdue submissions of projects and/or homework can be avoided. Scope and Limitation This study covers only two of the internet’s features; social networks and online gaming. Our survey would reach out to high school students at LLC-P, and high school students from other schools that always seem to come to internet shops to tend to their addiction.