ArticleBMC psychiatry2023
Effect of online game policy on smartphone game play time, addiction, and emotion in rural adolescents of China.
Article in BMC psychiatry, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 23 citations in OpenAlex.
- Development and Psychometric Validation of the Chinese Online Disinhibition Scale for Adolescents.PsyCh journal · 2026Article
- Development and validation of a nomogram to predict mobile phone addiction risk among Chinese adolescents.BMC psychology · 2026Article
- Beyond the debate: toward pragmatic evaluation of Australia's social media age restrictions.The Lancet regional health. Western Pacific · 2026Review
- Atypical cortical neural activity in internet gaming disorder comorbid with autism spectrum disorder during a cue reactivity task: A magnetoencephalography study.PCN reports : psychiatry and clinical neurosciences · 2026Article
- Internalizing and externalizing pathways to internet gaming disorder: the roles of anger and social anxiety.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2026Article
- Policies and public health initiatives to mitigate the mental health impact of internet use among children and adolescents.Indian journal of psychiatry · 2025Article
- Better than industry self-regulation: Compliance of mobile games with newly adopted and actively enforced loot box probability disclosure law in South Korea.Acta psychologica · 2025Article
- Neural Correlates of Resistance to Gaming Desire Induced by Social Media Content.Addiction biology · 2025Article
- The mediating effects of smartphone addiction in the association between mental disorders and eating disorders: findings from a nationwide survey among Chinese youth.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Facial Emotional Expression in Reaction to Internet Gaming Videos Among Young Adults: A Preliminary and Exploratory Study.Neuropsychopharmacology reports · 2025Article
- Burden of gaming disorder among adolescents: A systemic review and meta-analysis.Public health in practice (Oxford, England) · 2025Review
- The impact of physical exercise on internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors among middle school students: correlation and regression prediction analysis.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2025Article
- Nationwide Trends in Screen Time and Associated Risk Factors by Family Structures Among Adolescents, 2008-2022: Nationwide Cross-Sectional Study.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2025Article
- Classifying problematic gaming using a latent profile approach based on personality traits in Chinese young adolescent.BMC psychiatry · 2025Article
- Excessive smartphone use in Tibet Autonomous Region: biopsychosocial and health behavior factors.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2025Article
- Internet Gaming Disorder Among Rural Left-Behind Children in China: A Sociological Qualitative Study.Psychology research and behavior management · 2025Article
- Measurement Invariance of the Lemmens Internet Gaming Disorder Scale-9 Across Age, Gender, and Respondents.The Psychiatric quarterly · 2024Article
- Explicit and implicit effects of gaming content on social media on the behavior of young adults.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
15 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundSmartphone game addiction has emerged as a major public health problem in China and worldwide. In November 2019 and August 2021, the National Press and Publication Administration of China implemented two increasingly strict policies, as a means of preventing smartphone game addiction in adolescents aged 18 or below. This study aimed to analyze the effect of the policies on smartphone game play time, addiction, and emotion among rural adolescents in China.
methodsWe sent the questionnaire to rural adolescents through the online survey tool Questionnaire Star, a professional online survey evaluation platform. The questionnaire included demographic data, smartphone use survey, smartphone game addiction and emotion evaluation scales. The Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version (SAS-SV) measured adolescents' smartphone game addiction. The Short Version of UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale (SUPPS-P) and Social Anxiety Scale for Children (SASC) measured emotion. According to SAS-SV score, the enrolled rural adolescents were divided into addiction group and non-addiction group. The t-test, Chi-square test, and repeated measure ANOVA assessed the effect of the policies on adolescents' smartphone game addiction and emotion.
resultsAmong enrolled 459 rural adolescents with a mean age of 14.36 ± 1.37years, 151 (32.90%) were in the addiction group and 308 (67.10%) were in the non-addiction group. Adolescents in the addiction group were older, more male, and higher grade. There were time and group effects between the two groups in playtime. After a year of policies implementation, the weekly game time dropped from 3.52 ± 1.89 h to 2.63 ± 1.93 h in the addiction group and from 2.71 ± 1.75 h to 2.36 ± 1.73 h in the non-addiction group. There were also time and group effects in SAS-SV and SASC scores, but not for SUPPS-P score. In the addiction group, the SAS-SV score dropped from 41.44 ± 7.45 to 29.58 ± 12.43, which was below the cut-off value for addiction, and the level of social anxiety was consistently higher than non-addiction group.
conclusionsThe playtime of rural adolescents spent on smartphone games has decreased significantly due to the restriction of the policies rather than the lack of addiction or social anxiety. The policies had practically significant effects in reducing smartphone game play time for rural adolescents in China.
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