Skip to main content
Home

Main navigation

  • Top stories
  • Health
  • Crime
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Tech
  • Culture
  • Sports
  • Weird
  • 1-1-2
Image
Tim Reynders
Tim Reynders - Credit: Photo: Tim Reynders / Facebook
Health
Inge Schopenhouer
Jelle Jones
Justine Pardoen
Bureau Youth and Media
Onno Hansen-Staszynski
choking game
internet challenge
Arkel
Tim Reynders
Friday, 16 June 2017 - 11:10
Share this:
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • linkedin
  • whatsapp
  • reddit

Teens don't see risks of online challenges like choking game: experts

The reason that dangerous online challenges like the 'choking game' claim so many victims - like 16-year-old Tim Reynders who died in Arkel last month - is because teenagers do not think about the consequences before attempting them, according to experts on teenagers, their brains and behaviors. Where an adult will immediately see the dangers, the thought would not even cross a teenager's mind, they said to AD.

During the May holidays Anita and Geert Reynders came home with their daughter to find their 16-year-old son Tim dead. He lost consciousness while doing the choking challenge, and suffocated because the belt he used was still around his neck. Tim filmed his death on his own cellphone. A month after his death, Tim's parents decided to tell his story - to warn others about the dangers.

"The message is especially that parents should not think 'my child would not do that'. This also did not suit Tim. He was a calm, careful boy who pointed out danger to others. And still it happened", Inge Schopenhouer, the Reynders family's spokesperson, said to AD.

According to Jelle Jones, professor of neuropsychology and an expert when it comes to the teenage brain, teenagers simply don't see the dangers. Their brains aren't wired to consider consequences, he explained to AD. Where an adult would look at the choking game and think, oh, that's dangerous. A teenager will only see that it's fun.

According to Justine Pardoen of Bureau Youth and Media, challenges have been around forever. "My grandfather had a challenge with his friends in 1902 about who could derail the first tram", she said to AD. The big difference now is that challenges can reach a much larger audience through social media.

Challenges are also increasingly difficult and dangerous, because you want to get as many viewers as possible. The crazier the challenge, the more viewers. "For viewing figures you need to do extreme things to keep viewers", blogger Onno Hansen-Staszynski said to the newspaper. "People laugh very hard at accidents in which you have to wonder if the victim survived it. Nobody has compassion."

According to Pardoen, the only thing to do is to talk to your teenagers about the dangers involved in doing internet challenges. Tell them never to do them alone. So that if something goes wrong, there is someone there to help. "Because forbidding makes no sense. There is a chance that they have been doing it for a long time, but don't dare to talk about it."

Follow us:

Latest stories

  • Oranje beat Gibraltar 3-0 in Rotterdam
  • A €0.15 deposit on 2.5 billion cans per year is a “gigantic operation”
  • XHamster tells court it can’t monitor consent for “old” amateur porn videos
  • Dozens of cars vandalized at Assen auto event
  • Gov't boosts education spending by €216 million; Won’t solve everything, educators say
  • Dutch tax office also wants to ban apps like TikTok from work telephones

Top stories

  • Asylum agency risking people's health by buying cheapest possible care: report
  • Engineering firm Arcadis apologizes for predecessor's role in WWII labor camps
  • One killed in Rotterdam shooting; Two injured arrested
  • Childhood trauma affects women differently than men later in life, study finds
  • Scientist Rebellion activists blindfold statues in the Netherlands, including Rembrandt statue
  • Suicide a growing trend as more young adults end their lives

© 2012-2023, NL Times, All rights reserved.

Footer menu

  • Privacy
  • Contact
  • Partner content