Peer-reviewed article
Children’s Well-Being: Parental Awareness on Child Internet Addiction
Abdul Rashid Abdul Aziz, Amin Al Haadi Shafie, Mohd Azrin Mohd Nasir, Mohd Ropizam Mohamad Zainun, Warlan Sukandar et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This qualitative scoping review examines parental awareness of internet addiction among children in Malaysia by analyzing 38 articles published between 2015 and 2023. The study identifies family awareness and understanding of each family member's role as critical to addressing child internet addiction. Five key management elements are highlighted: monitoring internet use, limiting time and space, applying psychological rewards and punishments, instilling moral and spiritual values, and involving parents and children together in social activities. The findings are intended to guide educators and community workers supporting families dealing with child internet addiction.
Key points
- Family awareness of internet addiction and understanding of each family member's role is crucial for managing the problem
- Controlling and monitoring children's internet use is identified as a key management element
- Limiting time and space for internet use is essential in managing child internet addiction
- Application of moral and spiritual values is an important strategy in addressing internet addiction
- Joint involvement of parents and children in social activities helps overcome internet addiction
Limitations
This is a scoping review of existing literature rather than a primary empirical study, so it cannot demonstrate the effectiveness of proposed interventions through direct measurement. The review does not provide quantitative evidence on the outcomes or impact of the identified management strategies.
Abstract
Internet addiction among children has become a global health problem, including Malaysia. It raised public awareness of its increasing number. Most of the internet addiction risk factors relate to parents and their awareness regarding this issue. Therefore, this study was done to explore family awareness of child’s internet addiction and to identify the role of the family in overcoming internet addiction among children. This is a qualitative study using a scoping review design. The articles were obtained from the Academic Search Premier@EBSCOhost university database published from 2015 to 2023. A total of 38 articles were selected from the EBSCO-Host together with other relevant and significant articles from earlier years. Findings revealed that family awareness in term of understanding role of family members (parent’s role, sibling’s role, child’s role) is very important in facing internet addiction among children. Besides that, there are five elements in managing child internet addiction which include controlling and monitoring children's internet use, limiting time and space in children's internet use, the concept of psychological reward and punishment in internet use, application of moral and spiritual values, and joint involvement of parents and children in social activities. In conclusion, this study can be a guidance to the involved party such as educators or community in dealing and helping the family or parents who are facing with the issue of child’s internet addiction.