CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND

Introduction

In today’s generation, technology became one of the necessities of people

because of its ability to make the chores easier and give entertainment to the

people. Most of the people use technology to remove their boredom. In 21st

century, internet is also part of the technology that allows people to get access.

Internet becomes helpful to the students when it comes to their studies because

they can search anything over the internet unlike before that you need to spend

most of your time reading a book in the library just to find answers. But because

you are free to access over the internet, students can’t help themselves to see and

try these kinds of online games. Online game is a video game that is played over

the Internet or any other computer network. It was created to fill the free time of

the people and surprisingly it gets the attention of the teenagers. From the purpose

of giving entertainment to the people, it becomes part of the addiction of the

teenagers. Online game has a big impact to children especially to the teenagers if

they overuse it. They thought that it is normal to spend most of their time playing

online games without even noticing that their daily routine and academic

performances are getting affected.

All these technologies are very good at distracting people and in line with

this, online gaming was born to give entertainment to humans. On the other hand,

the problem is not in the online games itself but in the users. As stated by Hassan

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(2011), online gaming is good and bad. Good for those who know their limits and

bad for those who fix themselves in the seats for long hours and cut off the

interaction with rest of the world.

Online gaming can be addictive. This research tends to concentrate on

negative aspects, such as excessive play and addiction. Instead of spending their

hours on studying and doing their homework, children spend their time on playing

online games. These online games have negative effects to the students and it

might affect their academic performance. Academic performance defined as any

activities that a student done either in school or home which helps an individual to

grow when it comes to education. Academic success is often one of the most

obvious causalities of video game addiction. Children, teens, and university

students who spend all their free time playing video games will almost make their

grades low. They may ignore upcoming deadlines, promise to study "tomorrow",

deny that they have homework, and rush through assignments so that they can

continue playing. Many of the students have stayed up late just to play their favorite

online games and most of the time they don’t even remember that they have

something to accomplish such as assignments, paper works and projects.

Addiction in the online games can lead to consequences and one of those is failing

school due to lose of focus. It seems like virtual life becomes more appealing than

real life in the eyes of students.

The researchers want to conduct this research because they also

experience the same problem as other students. Both positive and negative

consequences are being shown when they are playing online games. According

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to Tenepere, a grade 11 student of PNTC Colleges, Dasmarinas Campus stated

that they also experienced playing online game during the class discussion without

any interest in the lessons. Another student from PNTC Colleges shared his

personal experience when it comes to excessive playing of online games. As

stated by Tubil, a grade 11 student from PNTC Colleges, Dasmarinas Campus, he

said that one of the main reasons why he lost his focus on different subject areas

is the online games. These two students coming from the same school proved that

excessive playing might turn to a negative result such as losing their focus in the

study and not finishing school due to a not having any interests in schooling.

The purpose of this research is to know the negative effects of online games

in the academic performance and to inform the students of PNTC Colleges how

excessive play of online games affect their studies. The researchers’ objective is

to understand the negative effects of excessive play of online games that leads to

a one of the biggest distraction when it comes to academic performance of

students.