Internet Addicts As Ill As Alcoholics?

suntac writes to mention an article on New Scientist, reporting on a Stanford study of internet addiction. The study finds that the U.S. is 'rife' with internet addicts, who may be as addicted as alcoholics to their sweet sweet net connection. From the article: "Nearly 14% of respondents said they found it difficult to stay away from the internet for several days and 12% admitted that they often remain online longer than expected. More than 8% of those surveyed said they hid internet use from family, friends and employers, and the same percentage confessed to going online to flee from real-world problems. Approximately 6% also said their personal relationships had suffered as a result of excessive internet usage. 'Potential markers of problematic internet use are present in a sizeable portion of the population,' the researchers note." While obviously allowing relationships to suffer so you can surf eBay is a problem, where is the line between relying on the internet for news and information and addiction?

only 6% ?

[Anonymous Coward]

only 6% said their personal relationships had suffered as a result of excessive internet usage? I am surprised it is not much, MUCH higher. I know it certainly is in my circle of friends and people I know.

No such thing as...

[twifosp]

I'm getting pretty sick of all the "Addicted to [insert something here]" articles on Slashdot. As far as I'm concerned they are all dupes of some type or another.

NEWSFLASH TO STORY SUBMITTERS AND EDITORS:

There is no such thing as addicted to the internet, or a video game, or anything except for a chemically addictive substance. There are only addicts. These people have an addictive personality and will be addicted to anything to pass the time. There are no addictions, just addicts. Unless it has something to do with a chemically addictive substance, please stop posting these inane flame bait articles.

I have an idea for a Slashdot post: Slashdot Submitters & Editors Addicted to Posting Pseudo Addiction Stories

Addictive personality

[aron1231]

This concept was brought up in the WoW addiction discussion, but my belief is that anyone can be addicted to anything they find enjoyable. Same holds true for the internet. Addiction is marked by it's damage-causing nature. Sure, if your girlfriend breaks up with you because of your internet use, you could be considered an adict. If you control your usage of the internet and it does't interfere with the rest of your life then it isn't an issue. Addiction isn't an object, it's a state of being.

Television Addicts

[decipher_saint]

So where are the reports for people who can't do without the Tee Vee?

Oh wait, right here [sciam.com].

Could it be that people are addicted to inactivity itself? I dunno, just a thought. Are there book addicts? If so, is it regarded as a problem?

Re:III?

[mapkinase]

That or /. Finally Stop Using Capitalization of First Letters.

internet addict, or workaholic?

[User 956]

only 6% said their personal relationships had suffered as a result of excessive internet usage?

So if internet-related tasks are part of your job, what's the difference between being an "internet addict" and a workaholic?

Based on this study ... other addictions

[Salvance]

"Nearly 14% of respondents said they found it difficult to stay away from the internet for several days"

Based on this same logic, we'd almost all be addicted to: driving, eating, refrigerators, using the toilet, showering, sleeping, and drinking. Sounds like we have a national epidemic brewing. If we can't figure out a way to get the 95% of the people who can't use the toilet for more than a few days outside doing something more productive, we may fall behind the rest of the industrialized world in technological and sociological accomplishments.

OK, on a more serious note, I think the article fails to drill down to the heart of the addiction - porn and games. The 6% of respondants who said the internet ruins their relationships are likely staring at photoshop enhanced boobies or playing WOW for 16 hours a day ... not clicking refresh every 5 minutes on the CNN homepage (although I'm sure those people exist too). I don't feel like the internet itself is an addiction, but rather a easy medium for addicts to gain access to their vice.

Actual Alcoholic

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, alcoholism is a disease. A physical dependency and a psychological obsession with drinking or "the first drink" or "the thought that he may one day be able to drink like a normal person". People fucking die from it, from that thought, that obsession.

No one dies (well, maybe that gamer in Hong Kong is an exception) from checking their email or playing too much World of Warcraft.

As a person with a serious problem with drinking, who is in AA (hense Anonymous Coward), the idea that someone using the internet too much is the same as the life threatening condition of being an alcoholic is insulting.

On the other hand, the 12 Steps can be used for any form of addiction. Gamblers use them, Cocaine addicts use them, Sexaholics use them. Why don't a few of these persons who are powerless over the internet try using the Steps (go to Barnes and Nobles, read the Twelve and Twelve) and see if it works? Why not report back to the group. Does /. have a mailing addess to send replies to?

If you're not willing to suck ...

[khasim]

If you're not willing to suck cock for money to support your addiction, you aren't addicted.

Anything can be "found" to be "addicting" if you phrase the questions correctly. But instead of "avoiding" other situations or spending time on your "addiction", they need to focus on the actions that an addict will be willing to perform to feed their addiction.

I guess we are addicted to all sorts of things

[Isaac-1]

Lets see other things most people find it hard to avoid for days.

Checking Mail

Paying Bills

Doing their jobs

Keeping up with their Childrens school work

Watching the News and/or Weather reports

Shopping

Just add the word online to the above and suddeny they become an addication.

Re:Vice != Addiction

[databoss]

Thank you! It amazes me how even MDs seem to get this wrong. Addiction is marked by phyisical withdrawl symptoms, and calling every habit an addiction is only going to confuse people, and even worse, hinder the progress of those trying to address the physical nature of addiction.

Re:Vice != Addiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, coffee is not just a "bad habit". Caffeine, when administered in anything greater than an average dose, can cause an increase of up to roughly 8% in mental alertness (although taken to extremes, caffeine can induce effects bordering the lowest plateau effects of speed). After becomining "dependent" on caffeine for an extended period of time, users will find that attempts to "kick the habit" will result in extremely debilitating migraines and occasionally cramping. Hardly what I'd brush off as "uncomfortable".

Besides that, you nailed it spot on. Great post.

Re:Sick as a parrot, then

[miyako]

Bullshit.
You are extending the definition of "addiction" far beyond it's intended meaning. "We, as a society" are not addicted to Foreign Oil or the Internet.
We have an Infrastructure built around the Internet and Foreign Oil which has been built up through significant investment over a long period of time
That's like saying that we have an "addiction" to the grocery store. People aren't addicted to grocery stores, we've simply been trained and adapted to living in a world where you get food from the grocery store. People would have a hard time if there were no more grocery stores and suddently they had to go hunting and gathering too. that isn't addiction.
I've seen real addicts, and there is a big difference between being an addict and adapting to an infrastructure.
...Or maybe you should tell Darwin that there is no such thing as evolution, some finches were just addicted to certain environmental niches ;)

I'll admit it quite openly

[petrus4]

If my net connection goes for more than probably four hours, I psychologically cease to function more or less entirely. Although that said, it still didn't stop me getting into a long term relationship, and although my girlfriend is a heavy net user herself, we still eat and do various other things together.

There are reasons why my life is so net-centric, though:-

• Before I first started using the net in around 1994, my life was pretty much completely devoid of purpose. I'd dropped out of school a year earlier with a ninth grade education, and at the time felt like a social outcast, though later realised that I hadn't been anywhere near as much as I'd thought. Once I got online, I started learning about Web development, Linux, and IRC scripting...Unlike at school, where I'd felt like a constant failure, (my marks were consistently terrible) I was finding things that I could actually feel that I was good at. The education system isn't designed to actually benefit people...it's primarily designed to psychospiritually break children so that as adults they become subservient to the society that exists at the time. Any genuine education that you might happen to get during that process is entirely incidental.
  
  
• For reasons I don't understand, with the sole exception of my girlfriend, pretty much every offline friend I've had has at one point or another stabbed me in the back, and that's included genetic family members. My father booted me out of home completely without warning, and one of my cousins stole from me incessantly. Communicating with people online means that while I get some form of socialisation, people aren't able to get close enough to me to be able to harm me...which I've found that tragically, they inevitably do if they are allowed to get close enough.
  
  
• Offline contemporary reality, to put it simply, just isn't very nice. Australia, England, and America currently all have fascist governments to varying degrees...liberalism and the health of democracy in these countries is at an all time low. Our leaders are absolute monsters, and it doesn't matter how much we complain or protest about the way they are treating us and other people...they don't care. The environment is in the toilet...A cousin of mine got back from visiting China not long ago and said she'd found out that there are no birds in Beijing because the air pollution is so bad...Makes me wonder what that's doing to the humans that are living there. We also can't travel anywhere unless we find the idea of being killed by some nutcase vainly trying to protest our governments appealing, who probably actually feels fairly similarly towards our governments to the way we ourselves do, truth be told.
  
  I realise that in light of that, simply advocating moving online in a wholesale sense might sound like the proverbial ostrich maneuvre...but if I knew of something I actually *could* do to change the political situation, I'd possibly do it...there just doesn't seem to be anything that can be done. I actually feel as though the only thing I really can do about the offline situation is to keep my head down as much as possible...and the net means I can at least construct some semblance of a life for myself while I'm doing that.