Students Engagement in Digital Games (Digital Addiction)

Abstract

The study investigates how senior high school students view digital games. Although students report that digital games provide opportunities for relaxation, enjoyment, and a connection to peers as the primary motivators driving play, they also highlight problematic aspects of use including gaming addiction, which may impact academic motivation and learning outcomes in negative ways. The findings present accounts from qualitative interviews with Grade 11 students from Silae National High School who recounted playing digital games after school on personal devices such as mobile phones, while balancing classroom obligations, homework, and family responsibilities. This occurred in resource-poor contexts where institutional guidelines for responsible gaming and digital well-being rarely exist. While many Philippine studies have quantified the link between online gaming and academic performance, generally reporting moderate negative impacts of regular gaming on grades, attention, and classroom participation (DepEd Region VIII, 2023; Rufo, 2023; Sumibcay, 2024; see also Mahmud et al., 2023), relatively few have qualitatively examined how senior high school students themselves make sense of digital games both as stress relief and academic risk in their everyday school lives.
Although recent qualitative research on the lived experiences of online gaming among Filipino senior high school students offers a glimpse into the rich and complex tapestry of habitual pleasure, social connectedness, stress relief, as well as preliminary signs of addiction, such studies are limited in number and typically focus on single or bimodal states. The students’ narratives suggest that, while they often seek relief from stress, boredom, loneliness, and pressure from studies and family by playing digital games for escape or relaxation (echoing some local evidence [e.g., DepEd Region VIII, 2023] as well as international research [e.g., Mahmud et al., 2023; Rufo, 2023; Sun et al., 2023]), excessive gaming is reported to cause significant problems with time management and distract them from school tasks, leading to sleep deprivation or missed opportunities for academic engagement. This research aims to describe and explore the perspectives and experiences of senior high school students in a Filipino public school concerning digital games, and how their engagement with digital games relates to balancing gaming time with academic performance and learning outcomes.
This study concludes with important suggestions for digital game engagement in a senior high school setting. It highlights students' perspectives, offering contextualized information that enriches findings beyond correlational statistics by illustrating how gaming, stress, family matters, and schooling intersect within real-life contexts. Findings specific to school-based guidance programs, as well as the role of the home in advocating responsible gaming, time management, and self-regulation strategies for students, would benefit homeroom advisories and parent-teacher initiatives promoting digital well-being in senior high school. Senior high schools should also ensure that discussions of digital well-being are incorporated into existing academic work and pastoral care structures. Future prospects may involve designing and piloting such targeted interventions as structured time-management workshops, digital wellness modules, or game-oriented learning approaches to harness student interest in digital games while counterbalancing their deleterious impacts on academic engagement and health, supported by emerging evidence from the Philippines and elsewhere that properly guided student engagement can alleviate the negative academic impact of online gaming (Mahmud et al., 2023; Online Gaming Addiction…, 2024; Sun et al., 2023).