The COVID-19 pandemic came with stay-at-home orders, virtual classrooms, online family and social interactions, with consequential rise in preference of spending time on digital devices rather than in social interaction and outdoor play activities. This trend has brought challenges to today's parenting with repercussions on social communication development of children resulting in an increase in the number of children presenting with symptoms of autism. The postulated mechanism could be the screen-based developed neuroplasticity adversely affecting social salience neuronal pathways. Other contributing factors could be the hindrance of screen overuse on social learning, parent-child interaction and child's interests on off-screen activities. Positive parenting with structured routine of settng screen-free time and zones, behavioral modeling and substitution along with virtual access to child psychiatry services and interventions can mitigate the surging risk of associated autism-like features in today's children.

Masturbatory behaviors occur as a part of psychosexual development in young children, but if such behaviors exceed resulting in discomfort and disability, it is known as gratification disorder. Children with such genital self-stimulatory behaviors are infrequently seen and diagnosed in Asian outpatient settings, possibly due to prevalent stigma. We report the cases of 3 children of 3, 4, and 8 - year-old with the diagnosis of gratification disorder based on comprehensive history-taking, general physical examination, and neurological examination along with videotape recording of the event. Investigations such as electroencephalogram (EEG), urinary microscopic examination, and culture were also conducted in each case. Clinical history, examination, and investigations such as EEG and urinary examination were reviewed. Behavior therapy and psychoeducation were successful in alleviating the disorder and allaying parental fears of taboo in all these cases. There was significant improvement in self-genital stimulatory behavior in all 3 cases at 3 months follow-up.