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"It is not that I must play games. I just do not like to go home, and I do not want to see my parents," Hao said.
"In fact, the problem is not with children, but with parents, who have not communicated well with their children," Liu told Shandong-based news portal Dzwww.com.
Communication is an important skill for a psychological counselor. "To solve psychological problems, first we should make friends with alleged addicts and listen to them speak their mind," Liu said.
She said that a counselor must have empathy, respecting and understanding the person seeking his or her service. Only by doing so, can a counsellor help others restore their mental health.
According to Southern Weekly published in Guangzhou, southern Guangdong Province, the first rehabilitation center for teenage Internet addicts in China was set up in 2004 by Tao Hongkai, then a guest professor at Central China Normal University in Wuhan.
In 2004, Tao read a letter published in Wuhan Evening News from a desperate mother worrying about her daughter's Internet addiction. The mother, Shu Mei, said her daughter Qu Qian had been a top student in her class. In high school, Qu became addicted to the Internet. Her grades plummeted to the bottom of the class. In May 2004, she was asked to drop out of the school because she had missed too many classes.
Tao invited the mother and daughter to his home, where he spoke to Qu for several hours. Tai said that after the talk, Qu was no longer addicted to the Internet.
The secret to his success, according to Tao, is never to blame the child. Instead he listens carefully to understand each child's character and personality.
Qu said that Tao told her that the computer is a tool, not a toy; those adept at using computer as a tool are really smart people, and those who only use a computer as a toy are losers.
Tao's story was widely reported, making him a celebrity. In 2004, he set up a research center in Central China Normal University to treat young Internet addicts.
Since then, rehabilitation centers for teenage Internet addicts had mushroomed in China, offering a wide range of therapies such as counseling, military-style boot camp, medication, hypnosis and even electroshock therapy. The cost of a rehabilitation session, which usually lasted for months, was also hefty.
Then in 2009, the death of 15-year-old Deng Senshan in a military-style training camp to treat Internet addicts shocked the country.
A police investigation revealed that four counselors in the Qihang Salvation Training Camp in Nanning, south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, forced Deng to run 5 km by beating him and putting him in confinement. The boy died less than 24 hours after checking into the camp.
In 2009, the government banned electroshock therapy and all other forms of physical punishment for Internet addiction.
Zhao Jing, Director of a national project service center, which is responsible for training and appraising psychological instructors for teenage Internet addicts, said recently that psychological counselors who resort to violence while treating addicts at rehabilitation centers will be disqualified from their job.
"Their licenses will be revoked by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security accordingly," said Zhao, according to the China Youth Daily on August 26.
Wu Yaxue, a psychiatrist at Huilongguan Hospital in Beijing, said that so-called Internet addiction may reflect deeper social and psychological problems, including mental illness, family strife, wrong parenting methods and setbacks in interpersonal relations, so different remedies should be used to address different causes.
"Before government defines Internet addiction as a mental disorder, sending children to rehabilitation centers against their will and treating them with therapies intended for mentally ill patients may have damaging consequences for these children," said Wang Xin, a law professor at China Youth University for Political Sciences.
Email us at: wanghairong@bjreview.com | 
