So, many who work with children and youth are wondering, how do I do therapy online with them?Īccording to Marketing Chart’s 2012 survey, they learned that 42% of teens are more comfortable sharing information and are even more open online than in person. They have had to hurdle legal and ethical considerations, onboard new HIPAA compliant software, learn to troubleshoot, all while managing their emotions, and their client's fears around the pandemic. “Whatever it takes to get you in the door.In response to " flattening the curve” of the spread of COVID-19 (coronavirus), many therapists, social workers, counselors, and others in the mental health field are taking their practices online. Connecting with patients in the realm of gaming where they feel safe can make a big difference, even if it means offering to meet up on a World of Warcraft server. “Therapy can be intimidating and difficult,” says Goldman. Families find him because of his non-judgmental approach and enthusiasm for gaming. Goldman regularly gets calls from parents of high school and college kids who hated therapy but still need to speak with someone. If traditional talk therapy has failed, gaming can be a crucial last-ditch opportunity to help patients. If a patient wants to spend the entire session playing Animal Crossing, how does the clinician link that activity back to a specific treatment goal-for example, honing social skills or building distress tolerance?Įven when the pandemic eventually ends and in-person counseling can resume, clinicians see reasons to keep online gaming in their toolkits. The challenge is ensuring that “we don’t do therapy in the way that’s fun for us we do therapy in the way that’s right for the client,” she says. “You want to be responsible and fulfill your social obligations.” When we log in to keep the streak alive, that unpleasant feeling begins to dissipate.Īs online gaming continues to grow, clinicians need tighter ethical guidelines around using it, Daramus tells me. “You keep the streak up because you’re anxious,” Rosen says. The daily login streak-a concept popularized by (but by no means originated by) Snapchat-is a perfect example. On the flip side, gaming can help us get rid of undesirable feelings, namely anxiety.
The more we play, the more feel-good chemicals we experience-primarily dopamine, serotonin, and other chemicals, says Rosen. Larry Rosen, professor emeritus and former chair of the Psychology Department at California State University, Dominguez Hills and coauthor of The Distracted Mind: Ancient Brains in a High-Tech World, says gaming can promote behavior modification that can develop into an addiction. A 2020 review of 53 studies determined the worldwide prevalence of the disorder to be approximately 3 percent of gamers. Though the World Health Organization recognizes gaming disorder as a condition, estimates of its prevalence vary. Recently, China tightened its already stringent regulations limiting online gaming time for kids under 18. Some experts have voiced concerns about screen time and online gaming addiction, especially in children. Soon the kids were enthusiastically leading each other around the game space, their shyness forgotten. Eventually, one boy mentioned Brookhaven, a roleplaying game set in a bustling city. Everybody has their cameras off,” says Goldman. In a Zoom session with two elementary school boys, Goldman kicked things off by asking the kids to name their favorite Roblox game. Goldman began training other clinicians to use online gaming in their work, starting with Roblox, a platform with millions of games that’s especially popular with kids ages 5 to 12 in the United States. As he and his colleagues struggled to connect with clients virtually, he wondered if gaming could help his patients too. In the bright, immersive world of online gaming, Goldman found solace-and he started to have fun again. But he didn’t start to feel better until he turned to a familiar pastime: video games. “I was exercising, I was meditating, I was doing yoga,” says Goldman, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Santa Clara, California. In the early weeks of the pandemic, Monet Goldman tried different strategies to cope with stress.
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