Hong Kong school pupils as young as seven are being referred for addiction counselling for online gaming, with requests for help involving increasingly younger children, a digital habits workshop has heard.Crystal Leung Chui-yee, officer-in-charge of the Sunshine Lutheran Centre, a counselling and treatment centre for problem gamblers, revealed the alarming frontline trend at a workshop organised by Young Post and the South China Morning Post’s student business, SCMP Learn, attended by about 70 parents on Sunday.Leung, a counselling psychologist, cited the case of a seven-year-old Primary Two pupil who was referred to her centre with a severe addiction to virtual subcultures and pay-to-win games.
SRCSouth China Morning Post
LANGEN
LEANCenter-Right
WORDS104
ENT11
SUN · 2026-06-28 · 15:19 GMTBRIEF NSR-2026-0628-88134
NSR-2026-0628-88134News Report·EN·Public Health
Pupils as young as 7 hooked on online games as expert warns of alarming trend
A digital habits workshop in Hong Kong revealed an alarming trend of children as young as seven being referred for online gaming addiction counselling. Crystal Leung Chui-yee, officer-in-charge of the Sunshine Lutheran Centre, a problem gambling treatment facility, shared this frontline observation at an event attended by approximately 70 parents.
Emily Tsang,Charlotte KwanSouth China Morning PostFiled 2026-06-28 · 15:19 GMTLean · Center-RightRead · 1 min
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
Reading time
1min
Word count
104words
Sources cited
1cited
Entities identified
11entities
Quality score
100%
§ 01
Briefing Summary
AI-generatedNEWSAR · AI
A digital habits workshop in Hong Kong revealed an alarming trend of children as young as seven being referred for online gaming addiction counselling. Crystal Leung Chui-yee, officer-in-charge of the Sunshine Lutheran Centre, a problem gambling treatment facility, shared this frontline observation at an event attended by approximately 70 parents. Leung, a counselling psychologist, highlighted the increasing age range of children seeking help for gaming addiction. She specifically cited the case of a seven-year-old primary school student who was referred to her center due to severe addiction to virtual subcultures and pay-to-win games. This trend was discussed at a workshop organized by Young Post and SCMP Learn.
Confidence 0.85Sources 1Claims 4Entities 11
§ 02
Article analysis
Model · rule-basedFraming
Public Health
Human Interest
Tone
Mixed Tone
AI-assessed
CalmNeutralAlarmist
Factuality
0.70 / 1.00
Factual
LowHigh
Sources cited
1
Limited
FewMany
§ 03
Key claims
4 extracted01
The trend of young children being addicted to online games is alarming.
quoteCrystal Leung Chui-yee
Confidence
1.00
02
A seven-year-old Primary Two pupil was referred to the Sunshine Lutheran Centre with a severe addiction to virtual subcultures and pay-to-win games.
factualCrystal Leung Chui-yee
Confidence
0.90
03
Requests for help involving online gaming addiction are involving increasingly younger children.
factualCrystal Leung Chui-yee
Confidence
0.90
04
Hong Kong school pupils as young as seven are being referred for addiction counselling for online gaming.
factualSunshine Lutheran Centre
Confidence
0.90
§ 04
Full report
1 min read · 104 words§ 05
Entities
11 identifiedKey playerOppositionContextPositiveNeutralNegative
Organizations4
Locations1
§ 06
Keywords & salience
8 termsonline gaming addiction
1.00
child addiction
0.90
young children
0.80
virtual subcultures
0.70
pay-to-win games
0.70
addiction counselling
0.60
hong kong
0.50
digital habits
0.40
§ 07
Topic connections
Interactive graph No topic relationship data available yet. This graph will appear once topic relationships have been computed.