Hold on a sec, there! nationalpost: Internet addiction has same effect as cocaine on brains: studyThis is your brain on the Internet: Messed up where there should be connections for making decisions and having normal emotions.Results of a new study suggest people who cannot control, cut back or stop their use of the Internet have abnormal white matter structure in the brain similar to what is seen in cocaine and crystal-meth addicts.According to the study’s authors, as the number of people logging onto cyberspace soars, “Internet addiction disorder” — which is poised to enter the official lexicon of psychiatric illnesses — “is becoming a serious mental-health issue around the world.”The disorder, as described in the study published this week in the journal PLoS One, is defined as “problematic” or pathological computer use that can cause “marked distress” and interfere with school, work, family and social relationships.For their study, led by Hao Lei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, researchers scanned the brains of 17 teens and young adults, aged 14 to 24, with Internet addiction and 16 healthy “controls” of similar age.People were classified as suffering from Internet addiction disorder, or IAD, based on a questionnaire that included the following: Do you feel preoccupied with the Internet? Do you stay online longer than originally intended? Do you feel restless, moody, depressed or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use? Yeah, yeah … internet addiction. I’ve got a significant problem with this claim, and this whole way of thinking, as do many others. It all boils down to this: “Internet use” is not just one thing, it is a mosaic of behaviors. How can we claim addiction if people use the internet in so many different ways? Sure, there’s certain specific behaviors and tendencies that are manifested online that share symptoms with traditional “addiction”, whatever that is. But everyone uses the tool in their own way. As neuro writer Vaughan Bell says: “internet addiction not possible because no single behaviour is associated with the internet. The concept is broken.” The internet is not heroin. It is not a specific chemical affecting a specific biological response and eliciting a specific molecular feedback loop of reward, tolerance and dependence. American and European psychiatrists do not recognize “internet addiction” as a real condition in their diagnostic manuals. Rather, I think we should wonder what is behind these curious claims, and treat that behavior. The internet is just an expression of a deeper neurological condition. More: The Guardian - Can You Really Be Addicted to the Internet? Slate - The Addiction Habit (Are We Obsessed With Addiction?) Meta-analysis of “internet addiction” studies shows inconsistent symptoms, definitions (h/t to Vaughan Bell on those links)
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Hold on a sec, there!

nationalpost:

Internet addiction has same effect as cocaine on brains: study
This is your brain on the Internet: Messed up where there should be connections for making decisions and having normal emotions.

Results of a new study suggest people who cannot control, cut back or stop their use of the Internet have abnormal white matter structure in the brain similar to what is seen in cocaine and crystal-meth addicts.

According to the study’s authors, as the number of people logging onto cyberspace soars, “Internet addiction disorder” — which is poised to enter the official lexicon of psychiatric illnesses — “is becoming a serious mental-health issue around the world.”

The disorder, as described in the study published this week in the journal PLoS One, is defined as “problematic” or pathological computer use that can cause “marked distress” and interfere with school, work, family and social relationships.

For their study, led by Hao Lei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, researchers scanned the brains of 17 teens and young adults, aged 14 to 24, with Internet addiction and 16 healthy “controls” of similar age.

People were classified as suffering from Internet addiction disorder, or IAD, based on a questionnaire that included the following: Do you feel preoccupied with the Internet? Do you stay online longer than originally intended? Do you feel restless, moody, depressed or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use?

Yeah, yeah … internet addiction. I’ve got a significant problem with this claim, and this whole way of thinking, as do many others.

It all boils down to this: “Internet use” is not just one thing, it is a mosaic of behaviors. How can we claim addiction if people use the internet in so many different ways? Sure, there’s certain specific behaviors and tendencies that are manifested online that share symptoms with traditional “addiction”, whatever that is. But everyone uses the tool in their own way. As neuro writer Vaughan Bell says:

“internet addiction not possible because no single behaviour is associated with the internet. The concept is broken.”

The internet is not heroin. It is not a specific chemical affecting a specific biological response and eliciting a specific molecular feedback loop of reward, tolerance and dependence. American and European psychiatrists do not recognize “internet addiction” as a real condition in their diagnostic manuals.

Rather, I think we should wonder what is behind these curious claims, and treat that behavior. The internet is just an expression of a deeper neurological condition.

More:

The Guardian - Can You Really Be Addicted to the Internet?

Slate - The Addiction Habit (Are We Obsessed With Addiction?)

Meta-analysis of “internet addiction” studies shows inconsistent symptoms, definitions

(h/t to Vaughan Bell on those links)

(via brooklynmutt)

Source: nationalpost

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