by Mafalda Correa
David, 21, is a software engineering student in London. He moved from Portugal three years ago. New life, new friends, but the laptop came with him, and so did the unhealthy hours he used to spend behind it. Eight hours per day gaming, another five browsing. He did not need anyone telling him that it was too much, he knew that, but he liked it. Lately, he’s been feeling that this has to change and that he needs to get his life in order. “It’s my last year in university, I’m going to be an adult in six months. It’s time to face that. I can’t keep doing what I’ve been doing. I think part of the reason I don’t find interest in what I do is because I don’t do it enough. I need to stop gaming so much, sleep at normal hours, and start picking up books and learn for myself,” he says. |
There is no such thing as internet addiction. It doesn’t exist. It hasn’t been recognised as a disorder |
He recognises that the internet has often had a negative impact on him, but he does not believe it can be seen as some kind of “monster”. He does not think that it can be as damaging as other addictions, such as drug or pornography addiction, because information online can be helpful.
“In the end, it was a post I saw online that made me decide to get better and to work harder. No matter how many times my parents or even friends said the same thing, it didn’t get through to me because I couldn’t relate, but I could relate to this person online because he went through the same things I did,” he says. |
As far as numbers go for Britain in 2015, 86 per cent of the households had an internet connection; 74 per cent of adults used internet ‘on the go’; and more than three quarters of adults bought goods or services over the internet.
E-mail is the most common reason to use the internet, as 76 per cent of adults reported going online to check or send emails; finding information about goods and services comes in second with 69 per cent of adults doing searches on the internet for them.
Reading online news, newspapers and magazines have reported the largest increase in use, 62 per cent of adults use the internet for this purpose, more than three times the proportion doing so in 2007 which reflects directly on the decline of printed media. |
Dr Tom Buchanan, Psychology PhD, does not only believe that the effects of the internet are not overwhelmingly negative, similarly to David, but he also entirely rejects the concept of “internet addiction”.
“First, there's no such thing as addiction to the internet. It doesn't exist. It hasn't been recognized as a disorder by the American Psychiatric Association. So really, there's no such thing as ‘internet addiction’,” he says. Dr Buchanan has dedicated most of his research since the mid-1990s to the psychology of the internet, an area known as “cyberpsychology”. |
He explains how the understanding of the effects of going online has changed a lot in the last 20 years:
“If you look back to the late 90s, a number of studies were coming out talking about how exposure to the internet and going online would harm people, make people more depressed, more anxious and so on. There was lot of media publicity around it at the time, but what a large number of follow-up studies demonstrated is that this was not actually true. The effects in those early studies were very much overstated.”
Buchanan says that even though recent studies show that the internet is not addictive or “generally harmful” to people, there are instances where people can use it in damaging ways or as an escape from reality.
An example of this is the case of 19-year-old Lyla. Today, she spends around five hours per day accessing the internet, but she used to spend a lot more when she started using the online world as an escape during her early-teen years. As a secondary-schooler, Lyla felt that she was fat and ugly, and that she had awful skin, and was therefore not even good enough for what she calls “normal” forms of escape like drugs and alcohol. So the internet became her escape.
“If you look back to the late 90s, a number of studies were coming out talking about how exposure to the internet and going online would harm people, make people more depressed, more anxious and so on. There was lot of media publicity around it at the time, but what a large number of follow-up studies demonstrated is that this was not actually true. The effects in those early studies were very much overstated.”
Buchanan says that even though recent studies show that the internet is not addictive or “generally harmful” to people, there are instances where people can use it in damaging ways or as an escape from reality.
An example of this is the case of 19-year-old Lyla. Today, she spends around five hours per day accessing the internet, but she used to spend a lot more when she started using the online world as an escape during her early-teen years. As a secondary-schooler, Lyla felt that she was fat and ugly, and that she had awful skin, and was therefore not even good enough for what she calls “normal” forms of escape like drugs and alcohol. So the internet became her escape.
“I always felt uncomfortable in social settings up until the last few years or so. But the internet was easy. I could open my laptop and virtually be anyone I wanted to be,” she says.
Although she believes that she could have been doing something worse, she does not think going online did anything to help her problems either; if anything, she believes made it harder for her to get better. “The problem with using the internet to cope is that from the outside, you just seem lazy or like just any other teenager addicted to technology. Instead of people asking if you're doing alright, they tell you to get up and stop wasting your life away. You also start to believe that yourself – that you're just lazy and useless,” she says. |
Instead of people asking if you’re doing alright, they tell you to get up and stop wasting your life away |
Lyla says that these effects on the self-esteem of people who use the internet as an escape make it harder for them to stop using it that way.
Nevertheless, Buchanan says that many studies show that the internet can actually help people find social support, and that the time they spend online can help alleviate their anxiety or depression. People with anxiety might crave company, but at the same time avoid social settings for fear of being rejected; so, the relative anonymity of online settings might make it easier for them to socialise.
Corey, 24, is doing a masters in social work, her course is online and she spends most of her time at home in front of the computer. She started using the internet when she was 10 years old to escape the anxiety disorder that tormented her in real life. At first, she did it because it was fun, but later found it also worked as stress relief. She admits that spending too much time online can still bring her down and trigger anxiety attacks, but also maintains that her online life has helped her overcome anxiety.
Nevertheless, Buchanan says that many studies show that the internet can actually help people find social support, and that the time they spend online can help alleviate their anxiety or depression. People with anxiety might crave company, but at the same time avoid social settings for fear of being rejected; so, the relative anonymity of online settings might make it easier for them to socialise.
Corey, 24, is doing a masters in social work, her course is online and she spends most of her time at home in front of the computer. She started using the internet when she was 10 years old to escape the anxiety disorder that tormented her in real life. At first, she did it because it was fun, but later found it also worked as stress relief. She admits that spending too much time online can still bring her down and trigger anxiety attacks, but also maintains that her online life has helped her overcome anxiety.
“I am much better at approaching people today than I was when I was younger. I guess meeting lots of different people online made me more open towards people in real life, too. I have always had a social life in real life, but I was definitely socially awkward in my teenage years, which triggered anxiety. Today it doesn't bother me as much.”
Many other people like Corey have also found relief with the internet. Harper, 26, is a teacher, and even though she says she does not think about the internet while she is at work, she spends an average of fifteen hours per day on her laptop. Although the number may seem excessive, and she even admits that she often forgets to eat or sleep because she is too enthralled with what she is doing online, she does not believe that the internet has harmed her life in any way. |
“I am much better at approaching people today, meeting lots of people online made me more open towards people in real life |
In fact, she says it has done the opposite: “I personally got onto the internet when I was suffering from depression, it made me smile again.”
Harper believes she does a good job balancing her real life with the time she spends online. “Sometimes real life and the internet clash, I might want to be on my laptop when there’s something important happening in real life. But I always choose my real life, because I can stop playing and then come back, I can’t stop living and then come back to life,” she says. |
Technology and internet are the present and the future. Humanity is not going to go back to not having them around. Children are picking up phones and tablets sooner and sooner; technology is reaching out to every corner of our lives, and Wi-Fi networks are essentially the spider webs of the developed world. With internet at home and internet on the go, it seems inevitable that people will keep spending more time online – but fear not, it does not seem to be actually making us crazy.
It might not be making us sane either, but as Buchanan said, it is not proven that it is harmful to people, and as the experiences of our interviewees suggest, it might be helpful with some psychological struggles, or at the very least, as an escape from life’s woes.
It might not be making us sane either, but as Buchanan said, it is not proven that it is harmful to people, and as the experiences of our interviewees suggest, it might be helpful with some psychological struggles, or at the very least, as an escape from life’s woes.