Internet Addiction: the Need for the Net Grows

Internet addiction is real and like drug addiction or alcohol addiction, its effects can be devastating to addicts and their families. 

“It starts to interfere with your relationships, causes you trouble on the job, socially, or within your marriage” says Dr. Jay Fawver, a local psychologist who’s seen a growing number of patients who have a constant need for the internet. 

Fawver says an internet addiction impairs you from doing the things you need to do in a day-to-day-life. “I've seen people who have experienced these internet addictions come to me and number one, they'll have depression, they'll have irritability” says Fawver.

A study out of Stanford University estimates that about 1-in-8 Americans suffer from some form of an internet addiction. “It's everywhere, it's part of everyday life” says a Fort Wayne college student. The problem with internet addiction is that it becomes a part of our lives. The internet is all around us whether it be on a laptop or on a cell phone. 

“When someone has an internet addiction they are significantly stimulating a part of the brain called the nucleus accumbens” says Fawver.

The same chemical that is released when drinking alcohol, using cocaine or gambling is released while surfing the web. “If you can stimulate that part of the brain with something extremely exciting it wants you to come back to it again and again” Fawver says. 

To many, the internet is a safe-haven, a barrier, leaving them more comfortable and more often saying things they would not normally say face-to-face, which is why sites like Facebook and Twitter are taking social networking center stage in cyberspace. 

According to Facebook.com, an average user spends more than 55-minutes a day on Facebook, doing things like updating a status, writing on a friend's wall or uploading a photo. That's 335-hours, nearly 14-days, 2-weeks a year spent on the popular social networking site. 

“The social networking sites on one hand, it, to some people, will make them feel important. They will perceive that others really care about what they're doing on a day-to-day basis. They feel like a celebrity” Fawver says. He adds “they think they're attaching themselves more to society, but they're actually removing themselves more from society with those social sites.” 

Internet addiction is a fairly new idea and is still being explored, understood and figured out by psychologists, but Fawver says it's undoubtable that more problems will arise with internet addictions in the future. “We obviously have narcotics anonymous, alcoholics anonymous, we have gamblers anonymous. I think the day's going to come where we're going to hear about more internets anonymous out there” he says.