When I was 9 years old, Saturday afternoons were spent playing patintero with neighbors in the middle of the street, fishing for guppies from the water that ran through the dark, street canal, and heating the poor creatures up on clay pots for the mere sick fun of it, sorting through the landlord’s garden to find black ants to keep in bottles as pets, and picking up the kutsintas my mother ordered for snacks three streets away, which involved walking through an eskinita, and crossing two roads, back and forth, with as much as P30 clutched in the palm of my hands. Those were the best days of my  life. 

Thirty years later, on a Saturday, the same street is empty, except for a few teenagers shooting hoops at the side of the road and maids sweeping dried leaves off the floor. Where are all the kids? Exploring their childhood , I suppose,  not by experiencing the world, but by crafting  their own version of it, through the computer.

Why is it  that many kids these days would rather interact with an electronic device  than with living, breathing human beings?

Psychologists have their theories. Children, and even adults, have tremendous stimulus hunger – or the constant  search of excitement. The hyperactive environment offered by computer games  and the Internet feeds their need for excitement. 

Children, particulary 5-12 year olds, are like sponges, exploring ways to assimilate knowledge into their brains. When information is presented in the form of a story , metaphors or a puzzle, they become even more receptive.  The Internet  and computer games offer such metaphors, puzzles and stories. Easily, kids can  imagine that they are a character in a story or a game. This is reinforced by parents who feed the illusion that they are super heroes or princesses.

Another psychological reason why kids love computers is their need for attention. Eye contact plays a huge role in making kids feel that they are getting that attention. However, kids from age group of 5 to 10 years are unable to establish eye contact with adults  due to the physical distance in terms of  height, lack of confidence, and because the vision center in the brain is still under development. At this stage, they are more comfortable in concentrating on objects at close proximity. While adults often fail to establish eye contact when conversing with children, computers are able to connect eye to eye with kids, thus fulfilling their hunger for attention.

Computers also provide children with a sense of empowerment. When they are around adults, they have to follow the rules. The children feel powerless. The computer creates a world for them where they are in complete control. They can make or break things without being scolded. They can quit a losing computer game and restart. When they win, they  feel superior .

There is, however, a flip side to all this. Researchers claim that the instantaneous results that children get from clicking the mouse makes them lose the ability to concentrate. They also hypothesize that the frequent and long hours of use of computers by young children could be a cause of Attention Deficit Disorder, which coud be attributed to the computer’s “sensory laden environment”.

Furthermore, studies suggest  that children who play violent computer games experience an increase in physiological signs of aggression – the same feelings that occur when people get into a real fight. In contrast, children who play non-violent computer games do not show such signs of aggression.

As always, parents have a lot to do with children’s fascination with computers. Most kids want to be like their parents. When they see their parents going online or playing computer games for the most part of the day, they want a part of it too. Likewise, kids who are hooked on television often have parents or guardians who watch television for long hours. 

Perhaps we should be worried that our kids are finding the virtual world more satisfying  than the real world.  While  the pervasiveness of computers have indeed altered children’s ideas of play, it still remains only a small portion of what consists their childhood. Our influence as parents far surpasses that of a computer’s. Without a doubt, kids would still rather go out and play, if only we, as parents, would spend more time interfacing with our kids than with the computer.