MCI's Survey Suggests Low Awareness among Parents on Child's Online Gaming Activities

13 FEB 2024

MCI’s Survey Suggests Low Awareness among Parents on Child’s Online Gaming Activities; New Resources Launched to Support Parents in Guiding Children to Navigate Online World

  • One-third of youths surveyed played online games with strangers, sometimes or frequently

  • One-third of youths surveyed came across vulgarities or violent content in games, sometimes or frequently

  • Only three in ten parents surveyed were fully aware of who their child gamed with

  1. To better understand youths'; gaming habits and their parents'; awareness and efforts to manage the impact of gaming on their child's well-being, the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI) conducted a door-to-door survey from October 2022 to February 2023 with 810 Singaporean youths aged 10 to 18 years old, and their parents. Youths who played online or video games at least once a month were surveyed.

  2. While MCI’s survey focused on potential risks and dangers that youths may be exposed to, it did not conclude that online gaming only resulted in negative impacts. Other studies showed that there were benefits of gaming, such as enhancing perceptual and motor skills, promoting teamwork and prosocial behaviour, and providing platforms to express creativity and imagination [1] . MCI’s survey sought to highlight the need to raise parents’ awareness of their child’s gaming activities, and encourage youths to make more informed decisions about their gaming behaviour.

Key Findings

Youths’ Exposure to Potential Harms from Online Gaming

  1. The survey found that about one in two (47%) youths aged 10 to 18 years old gamed every day. Those who did, tended to play for two hours [2] or more in each gaming session.

  2. While the majority of youth respondents (64%) never or rarely played online games with strangers, about one-third of them (36%) played games with strangers sometimes or frequently. Some 14% had also engaged strangers outside of gaming [3]. Such behaviour presents a risk of potential exposure to adult predators and online scams.

Figure 1: Youths’ Interactions with Other Players

  1. Among respondents aged 13 to 18 years old, 17% experienced in-game bullying from other players. However, close to half (48%) did not take any action, and only a minority (8%) spoke to their parents about the experience.

  2. More than one-third (38%) of those 13 to 18 years old had sometimes or frequently come across vulgarities or violent content in games. Those who played first-person shooter games were more likely to come across both types of harmful content.

Parents’ Awareness of Youths’ Online Gaming Activities

  1. Parents generally had low awareness of their child’s gaming activities. Only half (48%) of the parents surveyed were able to give an accurate estimate of the amount of time their child spent on gaming. Only 3 in 10 parents (31%) were fully aware of who their child gamed with, while 1 in 4 parents (25%) were not at all aware of who their child gamed with.

Figure 2: Parents’ Awareness of Child’s Interactions with Other Players

  1. Parents who were concerned about their child’s gaming habits were more likely to actively manage their child’s gaming activities, including setting limits on gaming time (54%) and using parental control tools (22%). However, for youths whose parents set limits on gaming time, 24% lied to parents about the actual amount of time spent. This suggests that restriction on gaming time alone is insufficient to manage youths’ gaming activities. More needs to be done to raise the awareness of potential risks and dangers associated with online gaming and encourage youths to make more informed decisions about their gaming

Initiatives to Support Parents

  1. MCI and the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) have been working with partners from the people, private and public (3P) sectors to enhance online safety of Singapore users, especially our youths. For example, MCI worked with technology companies such as Google, Meta, ByteDance and X (formerly Twitter) to launch an Online Safety Digital Toolkit in March 2023 for parents. This toolkit recommends parental controls, privacy and reporting tools, as well as self-help resources for individuals and parents to manage their own or their child’s safety online. Separately, the Media Literacy Council (MLC), comprising representatives from 3P sectors, has produced educational resources to equip parents with knowledge and tools to keep their children safe online and guide them to be responsible users of digital technologies.

  2. As a step-up of existing efforts, IMDA will roll out new bite-sized materials to support parents in guiding their children to navigate the online world more safely and responsibly. These resources will be rolled out in phases on the Digital for Life (DfL) Portal (https://www.digitalforlife.gov.sg/parent) from February 2024 onwards, and also on the Ministry of Social and Family Development’s Families for Life Parenting website and Ministry of Education’s Parents Gateway. The resources will be organised according to children’s ages and digital milestones, such as a child’s first smartphone, social media account or online game. Examples of topics covered include managing children’s screen use, cultivating healthy online habits and safeguarding children from online risks such as cyberbullying and online sexual grooming.

  3. In addition to these new educational resources, DfL partners will also be conducting workshops, webinars and family activities. For example, TOUCH Community Services’ “First Device Campaign” prepares parents for the milestone of a child receiving his/her first digital device, and social enterprise Cyberlite Books’ quarterly cyber safety talks educate parents and caregivers of primary and secondary school children on safe screen use and online gaming. These efforts will ensure parents are adequately equipped to guide children to be confident and responsible users of digital technologies.

Safer Internet Day 2024 Public Engagement

  1. The new resources and initiatives to support parents were announced by Mrs Josephine Teo, Minister for Communications and Information, at a public engagement session on 13 February 2024, in support of Safer Internet Day 2024.

  2. The session was attended by over 50 participants, including MLC members, academics, community and industry partners, teachers, parents and youths. Participants discussed key findings from MCI’s survey and brainstormed ideas on how 3P partners can work together to promote digital wellbeing.

[1]: The Ministry of Health’s evidence review of screen use in childhood (2022) summarised both the positive and negative impacts that can potentially arise from gaming. Beyond gaming, it also examined the impact of watching TV, and use of computers and/or mobile phones.

[2]: The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that for children above six years old, gaming time should be limited to under 60 min/day on school days and two hours or less on non-school days. This allows children to balance gaming with other activities, such as socialising, physical activity and homework.

[3]: This refers to having done at least one of the following: (a) chatted with strangers about non-gaming related topics, (b) shared personal information with strangers, or (c) met strangers in person.