'No gadget hour' campaign promotes family bonding

IPOH: The 'No Gadget Hour' campaign by the National Population and Family Development Board (LPPKN) in Perak is aimed at ensuring that parents spend more quality time with their children instead of the whole family always fiddling with their gadgets.
State Women and Family Development, Community Welfare, Housing and Local Government Committee chairman, Datuk Rusnah Kassim (pix) said the campaign was to strengthen the family bond and to promote interaction between parents and their children and among family members.
"The social media development today has shown that moral degradation and other negative elements have become even more complex.
"Do not let the use of smartphones or gadgets cause families to be in disarray, spouses quarrelling and splitting and the children neglected or worse still, getting involved in unhealthy and criminal activities," she said at the state-level 1Malaysia National Family Month 2017 celebration, here, today.
In this regard, Rusnah urged parents to spend quality time with their children by limiting the use or not using the gadgets at all when together.
Meanwhile, LPPKN deputy director-general (Management), Abdul Shukor Abdullah said the 'No Gadget Hour' campaign focused on human values such as good attitude, behaviour, thinking and norms in their daily life to maintain happiness and harmony in the family.
He said the proliferation of social media such as Facebook, WhatsApp, WeChat and Twitter had resulted in children spending more time each day on their gadgets to the extent of making them anti-social, refusing to interact and not listening to their parents.
"There are also children who lack attention from their parents because the parents are always fiddling with their gadgets instead of spending time and interacting with them," he added. — Bernama