2023-10-23 16:31:53
They were born “with a ‘Ferrari’ in their hands – smartphones that connect them to the world and also expose them to globalized risks – but they do not yet have the tools to be able to fully control the vehicle. They are not physiologically ready”. This is how Gen Z experiences even dangerous social challenges. “Many of these are food-related.” Like the latest trend that has been popular online for a few months, the ‘Hot Chip Challenge’, which consists of eating a super spicy chip, without drinking or trying to soften the blow. A challenge which, again according to what was reported on social media, would also have caused illness and which minors can access, given that the product is also sold (in a coffin-shaped package) on the Internet. “Among Italian students aged 11-17, approximately 243 thousand have participated at least once in social challenges, 6.1%”, reports Claudia Mortali, lead researcher at the National Center for Addiction and Doping of the Higher Institute of Health, to time.news Health. .
Food challenges
In food, social challenges “are very widespread – highlights the expert – There are many also imported from America and other countries. They are fashions and globalization is very strong in this. In fact, it is enough for young people to see the video for them to overcome the borders. Food always has a fairly strong impact, because the challenge is easier to do, due to the simplicity of the material on which it is based. You can buy anything and apparently it seems less dangerous than, for example, jumping from a high floor into a swimming pool. Maybe the initial aim of those who enter into these challenges is to make people laugh, in their idea the risk is not that great and they think they can keep it under control. At most they think they can experience temporary discomfort”.
“Beware of the risk of addiction”
The numbers on social challenges cited by Mortali are those of a “research conducted with the funding of anti-drug policies, to investigate the behavioral addictions” of children. “The social challenge is not an addiction – he specifies – but it is certainly a dangerous behaviour, linked to a distorted use of mobile phones and social media, and very connected to addictive behaviours”. And in fact “the more you are at risk” of developing addiction “the more you also face these challenges. In fact, we have seen – reports the expert – that all those who already had problematic behaviors with respect” to the topic of behavioral addictions “practiced social challenge to a greater extent than peers who did not have this risk”. For example, “if among 11-13 year olds, middle school children, around 7% of those who do not have the risk do social challenges, this percentage reaches up to 20-23% among students who have this risk of addiction and social withdrawal they have it. Many more, therefore.”
“And we have also observed – continues Mortali – that kids who practice social challenges have double the risk of becoming addicted to social media or video games, and even triple the risk of having a problem of social withdrawal”. The phenomenon of challenges, among other things, is more widespread among 11-13 year olds, while it seems to diminish slightly among the older ones, in the 14-17 age group. “The imitation factor of peers is very strong – underlines the ISS expert – and opens up actions that can actually escape the control of the individual, and then also of the parents”. For the study on Gen Z, more than 8,700 students between 11 and 17 years old were interviewed in autumn 2022, approximately 3,600 from lower secondary schools and approximately 5,100 from upper secondary schools across the entire national territory, in order to have a representative sample of the population.
“Greater prevalence of problems in the South”
“The country is somewhat divided in the level of severity of the disorders, that is, the prevalence of the various problems is increasingly greater in the South and in the Islands”, observes Mortali. Thinking about both addictions and social challenges, he continues, “it is clear that we must also remember that children in these age groups are not yet fully aware of what they are doing. To have a greater ability to resist these behaviors and impulses, we must wait until the brain is fully formed and up to around the age of 24 the prefrontal lobe has not yet finished developing. In the meantime, the tools that very young people have at their disposal offer ample possibilities. If the game in and of itself is a practice useful for development, the problem is that this globalization of the possibility of showing something apparently funny increases the risk that they can do dangerous things.”
A complaint was filed by the National Consumers Union regarding the ultra-spicy potato chip, forwarded to the Ministry of Health, Nas, the Higher Institute of Health and Antitrust. With respect to food, there is also another problem, the expert points out: “Used in a certain way – warns Mortali – it can be an instrument of addiction and correlate with eating disorders. So we know that many other problems can be triggered”.
“Parents monitor”
The invitation to parents is not to leave their children too alone with their smartphones, “and this applies not only to social challenges. The time they spend with these tools needs to be monitored because the amount of time is proportionate to the risk, according to this that we see in the investigations. And it is time taken away from important activities for growth, such as simply sleeping, studying, relationships with others, cultivating other passions. It is then necessary, naturally – the ISS expert continues – also try to maintain a lively relationship and conversation with your children, which allows you to notice if something is wrong, if they are doing something dangerous. This whole chapter needs great attention and we must understand how to prevent distorted use. We can deny the cell phone and the possibility of creating accounts before a certain age, but then, once we reach the moment in which we access the medium, we need to be taught to use it well. Because the dangers are many.”
#pericoli #Gen