Technology-Addiction is Taking a Toll on Children

It is obvious that technology has impressively changed over last few decades. Technology innovation has made life more convenient and enjoyable for everyone. I still remember that I had bought my first mobile phone during my university days just because to contact my father in case if I get stuck in any bad situation because university was quite away from my home and now the situation is that my little niece can’t get through a single meal without her tablet playing cartoons in front of her. Tablets, smartphones and gaming are gifted to them by this century and they are being raised with this constant influx of technology around them. No doubt it has number of advantages or I can say that the Internet technology is the solution of almost each and every problem. while all this good, our generation is still being negative affected.

While visiting my friends, I have seen their kids many times, are so use to these new devices and spend free time with tablets and smartphones that I can’t even imagine in my childhood. They prefer to stay at home and play video games rather than go outside and play with other kids of their age which I feel impacting health, their vision ruins due to constantly focus on bright screen and what they see during videos games violence, nudity, drug use, weapons etc. I think the main reason is that they see their older sibling or parent constantly on their phone or laptop, they do the same.

If I had kids, most probably they would be doing the same. One more thing that I noticed is that by using Google, Facebook and all other similar platforms, information is easy to access, or I can say that on one click unlike our times when we would participate in books fairs to find books to read, would go to libraries making assignments, all these things I miss in this generation. Even easy access to information could potentially be spoiling, with spoon-fed solutions from Google and an abundance of information of the wrong kind and you even don’t know what your child is browsing.

Actually, I am not criticising these technologies but I just noticed how our life style has been changed. If we talk about students, they join my groups and stick with the Internet all day, which are not even beneficial and ruin their social gatherings, face to face communications and discussions. When children spend most of their time on surfing the Internet, they become insensitive to the real life and people around them, including members of their own family.

Few days ago, I was watching a famous news channel. They were discussing over a criminal who kidnapped many kids by using their social accounts. I was wondered and shocked, how it is happened. Yes, off course, many students share their privacy in innocence like photos, their current locations and other details on different groups or on social media that should not be revealed and put themselves in difficult or bad situations.

The bottom line is that balance is important and having children grow up in a world that is so influenced by technology has both good and bad effects on them. There is nothing wrong with their use, as long as it is balanced. Technology has given us many opportunities in life but it can be addicting as well, but don’t let things like media and internet take a toll on your children.

screen addiction