"Electronic Heroin" - Internet Addiction in China

[Randy W]

from the NY Times

 

The video is at http://nyti.ms/1kOoRUt

 

The accompanying article is at China's Web Junkies

 

http://static01.nyt.com/images/2014/01/17/multimedia/opdoc-heroin/opdoc-heroin-videoSixteenByNine1050.jpg

 

Yet after four months of filming in this center (for our documentary “Web Junkie”), some vital questions remained: Are the children being accurately evaluated? And is the treatment effective? In many cases, it seemed parents were blaming the Internet for complex social and behavioral issues that may defy such interventions. (For example, we noticed that some patients experienced difficult family relationships, social introversion and a lack of friends in the physical world.) Tao Ran, the center’s director, claims a 70 percent success rate. If that’s true, perhaps China’s treatment model is something other nations should embrace, however disturbing it may seem to outsiders. There is still no real global consensus among experts about what constitutes addiction to the Internet, and whether the concept even exists, particularly in a strict medical sense.

 

Edited August 9, 2014 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Allon]

I guess the old definition of addiction is that if you take it away, is there withdrawal? Are there symptoms that affect the body, like tremors or dreams or even seizures? And if so, is the behavior repeated despite those symptoms? The withdrawal symptoms can take days even weeks to start with some drugs. With alcohol, it is considered 11 days from withdrawal until you can go it alone. With other drugs like crack cocaine, it can be hours before you need a fix.

 

With internet? I think that would be difficult to study. I think the Chinese are so driven to academics and to their children getting ahead and into college, that anything that takes them away (addiction, from the Latin meaning to talk, as in convince, surrender or lead away) from their studies for any long time, is an addiction. I was a drug counselor a long time ago and wary of definitions when it comes to addiction and so-called behavioral addictions vs. chemical ones.

 

With things like the internet it can be games or even a forum that causes adrenalin and other substances to increase in the body. And adrenalin is a very strong drug. Cortisol is a drug studied for its addicting properties, like addiction to work and study. So I guess it can happen....

Edited August 9, 2014 by Allon (see edit history)