The Zenter fir exzessiv Verhalen a Verhalenssucht (ZEV), a Luxembourg-based non-profit organisation that focuses on behavioural addiction prevention and support, is set to launch an initiative called the "Creative Club" from the start of the next school year.
Amid ongoing issues of teenagers being "glued to their screens", this programme aims to provide them with the tools to "create their own media while teaching them balance".
Chronicle.lu had the opportunity to speak with ZEV Director Dr Andreas König about this initiative but also ZEV's main mission and activities, which include counselling and out-patient therapy for people suffering from a behavioural addiction, as well as prevention workshops (currently for digital media use), training courses and continued education opportunities for medico-psycho-social staff.
Chronicle.lu: We understand that ZEV grew out of Anonym Glécksspiller asbl, a non-profit for people with gambling problems. Please tell us briefly about what inspired the creation of ZEV (which integrates previous initiatives such as "Ausgespillt" and "Game Over") in 2022 and its main mission.
Dr Andreas König: We occasionally got requests for support regarding other behavioural addictions or excessive behaviours such as buying-shopping disorder or problematic pornography use ever since the creation of Ausgespillt in 2010. Clients kept telling us they didn't find appropriate help anywhere else. Investigating which other services actually have a specialisation and experience in treating behavioural addictions revealed a worrying supply gap in the system, hence the idea. As to our awareness and prevention work, the trend to an earlier onset of problems made it clear that this has to go beyond excessive gaming and smartphone / social media usage.
Chronicle.lu: In what language(s) are your services/activities available? What support/services (if any) are available in English?
Dr Andreas König: For pragmatic reasons, the website focuses on French and German so far, but all offers are available in Luxembourgish and English, too.
Chronicle.lu: Please share some figures, for example approximately how many people have contacted ZEV and/or how many consultations/activities ZEV has offered since 2022.
Dr Andreas König: We record hours of therapy and counselling, since sessions might not only involve the concerned person, but also (and sometimes only) partners or family members, so the number of clients across different problem fields is hard to disentangle. But total hours of therapy/counselling were 1,024 in 2022 and 1,439 in 2023. About 75% of these are accounted for by gambling and internet use problems in approximately equal shares. We expect to reach about 2,000 hours of therapy and counselling this year.
Chronicle.lu: In your experience, have excessive behaviour and/or behavioural addiction issues increased in Luxembourg in recent years, for example since/during the COVID-19 pandemic?
Dr Andreas König: We don't have representative epidemiological data specifically for Luxembourg, but research shows clear evidence for this at least regarding internet use disorders, which haven't returned to the pre-pandemic level since. Problematic use of pornography (PPU) seems to be on the rise as well, especially among young males. We only offer help for the latter officially since October 2022, but in the first half of 2024, there have been more requests for help regarding PPU already than in the entire fifteen months before. However, you cannot give a proper estimate of changes in prevalence by looking at requests for therapy.
Chronicle.lu: Your service offer includes free and anonymous consultations as well as prevention workshops. Does ZEV target and/or reach a particular group or profile of people, for example teenagers? What can someone expect from counselling/consultation services when looking for support?
Dr Andreas König: Regarding workshops about media usage, we focus on teenagers, but in general, all offers from awareness raising to workshops and continued education to counselling and therapy are open for children, youth and adults alike. Regarding the latter, we think of excessive and addictive behaviours as something that started as fun or legitimate pleasure, but then went "over the top", so you always get an empathic and non-judgemental partner to accompany you through either a short counselling or a longer outpatient-therapy if needed and wanted.
Chronicle.lu: How has government funding helped ZEV carry out its mission and activities? Has the non-profit received support (financial or otherwise) from other sources/organisations?
Dr Andreas König: All our work is directly funded by the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education, Childhood and Youth. We sometimes receive funding for individual projects from the ONS, too, and rely on donations to cover for our own above-average continued education given a very dynamic field.
Chronicle.lu: Moving on to your new initiative, the Creative Club, which is launching in time for the 2024/25 school year and aims to tackle video game and social media addiction. Why are adolescents an important target group? You mentioned the issue of teenagers being "glued to their screens"... Is this a problem that could potentially lead to (or already represent) behavioural addiction issues, in your experience?
Dr Andreas König: While time spent [in front of] screens is not predictive on its own, it is an important risk factor for the development of an addiction. Youth in general have a higher risk of developing addictions. One reason being that the connections between the region in the brain that takes long term consequences into account and the more emotion and affect driven regions relevant in the moment of decision making aren't fully established until the late 20s. Therefore, prevention and early intervention are really important for adolescents. At that age, a lot of habits are formed – especially regarding emotion regulation and a sense of immediate vs delayed gratification. Thus, even if usage is not strikingly excessive, it can impact these important factors for mental health and success in life in general. Also, depending on the way they are used, frequent social media use is linked to anxiety and depression in young people. And we're up against a "data capitalism" industry that does everything to keep us in front of the screen as long as possible at as early an age as possible. So with the Creative Club, we created a way of helping youth actively deal with and process information about the risks while acknowledging that digital media are fun and help them using them in a productive way.
Chronicle.lu: Please tell us about how the club plans to tackle this concretely, what teenagers can expect from the programme, how long it will last, how it will be implemented…
Dr Andreas König: Our approach is all about learning while having fun. Andra Matresu and Oliver Stanislowski [who are in charge of the Creative Club] will empower participants with knowledge about how tech giants are locking them in, but we'll also equip them with the tools to understand, create and share their own content.
This pilot project, currently run by ZEV resources, will take place every first Friday afternoon of the month for about two hours, with occasional sessions on Saturdays. The programme will run throughout the entire school year, culminating in June 2025 with a cinema projection of the participants' work, where parents can see their achievements. The sessions will be held at ZEV premises, with field trips to industry players in gaming, social media and audio-visual production to give teens a hands-on experience.
With this initiative we want to build a community where teens go from passive consumers to active creators. We use tech for good and show it's cool not to be glued to their screens all the time.