Does The Internet Require A Health Warning: “Too Much Usage Can Be Harmful To Your Health?” Is Excessive Use An Addiction Or Just A Bad Habit?

Initial research at Stanford University in California shows that about one in eight adults experience withdrawal pains if they are away from the Internet for more than a few days. And about 10% of users know this is an addiction and try to hide it from their colleagues.

Elias Aboujaoude, director of Stanford’s Impulse Control Disorders Clinic, says more and more users are hooked on cyberspace and are seeking medical help. “In a sense they’re using the Internet to self-medicate. And obviously something is wrong when people go out of their way to hide their Internet activity,” he said in a report in the October issue of CNS Spectrums: The International Journal of Neuropsychiatricl Medicine.

He says the compulsion to constantly check for e-mails, or check web sites “is not unlike what sufferers of substance abuse or impulse-control disorders experience. If the Internet usage is repetitive, intrusive, and seemingly irresistible – giving much pleasure at the time – then perhaps that usage has gotten out of hand.

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There’s A Good Reason Advertisers Are Flocking to the Internet – New Research Shows The Very Rich Are the Fastest Growing Web Users
High-income users – those earning more than $150,000 a year – are more active on the web than any other financial segment in the US, according to Nielsen/NetRatings. Men favor the financial sites; women like entertainment sites; and both spend a lot of time on travel sites.

The telephone study of 2,513 American adults, the average age was 48 and earning between $50,000 - $150,000 annually, found that 70% of respondents admit to regular Internet usage, and 14% said they found it very difficult to be away from the Internet for more than just a few days. Some 12% said when they are online they stay online longer than intended and 12.3% admitted they should cut back on their usage. About 6% of the respondents said excessive Internet usages has affected their personal relationships.

The typical Internet addict is a single, college educated white male in his 30s who spends some 30 hours a week on non-essential computer use, Aboujaoude said. And while gambling and porn rank right up there with excessive usage, the survey indicates the problem is much deeper than that – shopping sites and chat rooms, blogs are all involved. He says there is still more to learn, and this first survey cannot count as a diagnosis, but where there’s smoke there’s fire.

If the excessive usage is a true addiction is there a cure? “You start by carefully diagnosing the patient, making sure there aren’t any other issues going on that should be treated, such as a major depression. When it’s identified as an independent entity, then psychotherapy would be the place to start. You give the patient the tools to gradually limit their online activities and deal with symptoms of anxiety, restlessness, and irritability as they resist going online for non-essential Internet use,” Aboujaoude said.

The Chinese, who with 123 million people online are second only to the US in the number of Internet users, are growing progressively worried that too much Internet usage is addictive to children, and authorities have already opened some clinics to help wean the children off compulsive Web use, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

Parliament is considering a legislation to “encourage research and development of technologies to prevent minors from becoming Internet addicts, according to Xinhua. The law would encourage research to develop software that would stop the availability of online gambling, for instance, at a fixed time, and would also keep minors out of Internet cafes, and other places where the Internet is available, after certain hours.

Such legislation is looked at with suspicion outside China since it will be seen as another attempt by authorities to regulate what Web surfers can see, including the barring of what are considered subversive or obscene sites.

Back in the US, one Internet usage where there does not yet appear to be an Internet addiction is watching TV online or downloading TV shows.

According to research carried about by TNS, the media research firm, for the Consumer Internet Barometer survey of 10,000 households only about 10% of Internet users watched TV programs online

The research shows the most popular video being downloaded is of short duration of say a minute or so, and the most popular such video is TV news. Entertainment videos are next but only 26% of those studied take the time to watch entire episodes of TV shows online. Only 6% of users said they would pay for video content and less than 5% actually pay a subscription fee for video content.

The survey points out that whatever video streaming is done on the Internet does not affect the amount of time the user will spend watching normal television. At least 84% of respondents said they watch as much TV as they used to even if they access Internet video.

Which does rather beg the question that with those numbers on how video usage is working on the Internet – that only a very small minority pays for video – then will those same usage patterns switch to the mobile phone platform, too?