Teenagers & Video Games: Helping Your Son Find Balance
Are you concerned that your son’s life is way out of balance?
He is spending too many hours playing video games, he is not interested in other activities, his social life is struggling and he doesn’t think it is a problem at all. The last thing he wants is limits from you or lectures about living a balanced life.
This post is all about helping your son find more balance in his life, even if he doesn’t want it! There are three things I want to share with you before we get into some practical ideas.
Don’t talk to your son about finding balance. I know that is an odd thing to say, but I encourage you to focus less on talking and more on doing. More on that in a minute.
You can’t make him do anything, i.e. find a hobby or spend time with friends.
You are the parent. You will have to make decisions at times that make him angry and that is OK.
For more support and strategies check out my parenting resource.
Teenagers & Video Games : A Parent Strategy Guide
Use time limits
By far, the most popular strategy used by parents is limiting the amount of time that their son is allowed to play video games.
To be honest there are only a handful of teenage boys who like video games and are able to responsibly monitor and manage their own time. Your son needs you to help him prioritize his time. I am not saying you should be controlling or try to micromanage his life, but he does need some reasonable and clear limits on when and how much. If you have let this slip in your house now might be the time to return to some workable time limits.
Encourage other activities
When I am talking to teenage boys I like to help them open their minds to the amazing opportunities of life. There are just so many cool things to do and experience. Boys want and need challenging experiences that make them feel alive and powerful. It is just easier (although not less legitimate) to do that with video games. He can join a club, play a sport, find a hobby, get a volunteer position, get a job, learn to build video games or any number of other fun and engaging things. You get the idea.
Of course, you already know from experience that you cannot make your son jump up and get excited about his life and the beauty around him. He needs encouragement, nudging and sometimes slightly more forceful prompting. In retrospect, I am grateful for the way that my Mom strongly encouraged me to do things like becoming an exchange student in Italy, signing up for a high school film project and joining the school jazz band. All things I would not have done on my own.
Allow him to be bored
This suggestion is pretty self-explanatory, but there are amazing benefits to being bored. It can boost creativity and encourage the pursuit of new goals. Most kids and teenagers have a hard time tolerating boredom and they see it as something to be avoided. However, this can allow your son to discover some different ways to entertain or occupy himself, especially if his gaming time is limited. Being bored might be the impetus that your son needs to find some new activities, especially if you resist the urge to solve the problem for him. :)
Take the video games out of his bedroom
It might be a good strategy to put the gaming computer or system in another room, really any place other than his bedroom. If the noise is a problem he can certainly wear headphones. If your son has access to his video games at any hour of the day or night there is a good chance that he will either stay up too late playing or wake up super early to get some time in. Both of these will affect his sleep, overall mood and certainly hinder him from finding balance in his life.
Make his gaming time dependent on something
This is basically an if/then contingency that can be effective. You might make his gaming time dependent on his participation in other activities, such as sports, homework, chores or extracurricular activities. Aside from daily homework, you can make gaming time dependent on him maintaining good grades or a certain GPA. This is a positive way to teach him about prioritizing different aspects of his life, finding the balance between work and play and how to manage his time more effectively.
For more support and strategies check out my parenting resource.
Teenagers & Video Games : A Parent Strategy Guide
Help him connect with friends
Sometimes teenage boys struggle with making and keeping friends. Often they are not motivated to make plans with friends or they might even experience legitimate social anxiety. Many times it is easier for them to connect with other people online, play games together and have conversations that don’t require eye contact. That is OK, but there should also be times when he hangs out with friends in real life (IRL).
While you can’t force your son to be social, you can certainly make it as easy as possible for him. You can provide transportation, set up your house to be a good spot for teenagers to hang out and generally assist him in having a functioning social life. You might get some kickback on this, but you can keep encouraging him without being too anxious or pushy.
Plan more family activities
I often hear stories from families who find themselves living a life where they have very little family time. This is understandable when you realize that teenagers often value their peer relationships over their family and there may not be many areas of overlapping interests with parents. Even though this is the case you can always make a change and plan more family activities. This could be as simple as a family trip to Starbucks, going to the beach, a movie or taking that family vacation that you didn’t get around to last year. I am a big fan of family rituals and they can be especially helpful to have in place during the teen years.
Remember you are the parent and you set the emotional tone and culture of your family. If you want to make a change and bring some balance to your son’s life you can consider making room for more family time. This is also a nice strategy because it takes the focus off of your son’s problem gaming and puts it on the positive pursuit of having a closer family.
Limit the types of games that he plays
There are certain types of games that require intense time commitments and can dominate a teenager’s life more than others. If your son is into these types of games you are likely very aware of this problem. These are usually role-playing games, also referred to as MMORPGs, which stands for massively multiplayer online role-playing games. Examples would include World of Warcraft, DOTA and League of Legends. These games are amazing and immersive and also difficult to manage in terms of time spent gaming. This is especially true because they require a commitment to other players in the “clan” or “party” and the matches can be quite lengthy.
This can also happen if your son is really involved in playing any type of multiplayer online games, including first-person shooter games (FPS), such as Call of Duty or Battlefield. It may be difficult, but very helpful to limit the types of games he plays at certain times. Maybe you can allow him to play these types of games on weekends so that his homework and family responsibilities are not affected as much.
Hit the reset button
It may be time to hit the reset button and take a day, a week or a month off with no video games. This is one way to “force” your son to find other things to do, engage with the family and be in a situation where he literally has to do something different. It is very important how you put this type of break into place so that it can be a positive experience and not just a punishment (in his mind!).
Address the issues that are causing problem gaming behavior
Whatever approach you take to helping your son find more balance in his life it is key that you find ways to address the underlying reasons that your son is gaming so much. It may be difficult to figure this out, but the reasons could be related to struggles in his social life, his self-esteem/self-image or anxiety and depression. You could follow all of the suggestions in this post, but neglect to address the core reasons why your son’s gaming is a problem and end up frustrated and ready to give up.
Many teenage boys are not skilled at communicating their needs, wants and emotions. You will have to do some respectful investigation, employ other trusted friends or family members and generally do whatever it takes to find out what he needs. It is definitely worth the effort and this may be the most important intervention.
Here is a recap of the suggestions that I covered
Use time limits
Encourage other activities
Allow him to be bored
Take the video games out of his bedroom
Make his gaming time dependent on something
Help him connect with friends
Plan more family activities
Limit the types of games that he plays
Hit the reset button
Address the issues that are causing problem gaming behavior
I hope these suggestions have sparked some good thoughts and creative ideas for you. I support you making every effort to maintain your relationship with your son while strongly encouraging and even requiring him to balance his life.
For more support and strategies check out my parenting resource.
