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Excessive Internet Use is Linked to Depression

Randomnity

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Typically, I think it's usually pre-existing conditions that drive one to use the 'net as a resource to self-medicate, so to speak. It's diverse, easy to use, and allows one to avoid direct social contact.

However, I think self-medicating that way as a long-term solution compounds the problem and will thus deepen the depression.

Look at alcohol, for example. it's not bad to use it as a social outlet from time to time, to alleviate stress, whatever else... but if you start doing it all the time, you actually change your body chemistry, brain capacity, physical health, dependency issues, and whatever else... making it even harder for you to break free.

All that time spent on drinking (or on the 'net) is time not spent finding a better solution to the problems at hand. Being on the 'net can also feel like a passive thing -- you're just feeding your indulgences but not necessarily engaging the world -- and even in the realm of the tangibles, your physical body health will worsen, you won't produce body chemicals produced during physical work/activity that help you feel good, etc.
Exactly this. It's mind-blowingly obvious to me that depressed people will spend more time online (assuming they use the internet at all normally). It's an easy escape from real life. I'm thinking of Wow and similar here too.

But, using it as an escape mechanism won't work any better than hiding at home in bed, or using drugs to escape.

What a poorly designed study, to show us a correlation that's totally obvious (as well as misleading). Oh well, it's not like it's the first to do that....
 

Such Irony

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I'm depressed by the thought of all the time I've spent on forums like this one to the expense of other activities.
 

Thalassa

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Exactly this. It's mind-blowingly obvious to me that depressed people will spend more time online (assuming they use the internet at all normally). It's an easy escape from real life. I'm thinking of Wow and similar here too.

But, using it as an escape mechanism won't work any better than hiding at home in bed, or using drugs to escape.

What a poorly designed study, to show us a correlation that's totally obvious (as well as misleading). Oh well, it's not like it's the first to do that....

I disagree that it's not better than using drugs to escape. You can actually learn things, read, and socialize with people on the Internet. I think it's a fuck hell of a lot smarter than being a meth head. It probably gives people with social anxiety friends that they wouldn't otherwise have had.

But, you know, get up and go for a walk or a jog or something once and a while.
 

KDude

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I disagree that it's not better than using drugs to escape. You can actually learn things, read, and socialize with people on the Internet. I think it's a fuck hell of a lot smarter than being a meth head. It probably gives people with social anxiety friends that they wouldn't otherwise have had.

But, you know, get up and go for a walk or a jog or something once and a while.

It kind of sucks though if you make friends and don't meet them or it's too long distance to meet enough. This applies to this site, but it's applied to me before elsewhere.

It's kind of a "lousy investment" if you think about it. As cool as some people are.

Hmm, I think I'm depressed now. :coffee:
 

Randomnity

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yeah, that's true in some ways, but you could rationalize alcohol in the same way (helps you socialize, fun experiences, whatever) and the kind of internet that becomes excessive isn't usually the educational type. I suppose you could say you could learn social skills from wow, but I'd argue that (in most cases) it's outweighed by keeping you from developing real social skills which include body language and so on. And in my experience it tends to make social anxiety worse, not better, because the fear grows as you avoid "real life" social contact, so you don't get the chance to learn that it's not so bad.

but yeah, it's better than say, crystal meth, or heroin, which have side consequences mostly involved with the money needed for them (and more health effects). Focusing purely on the obsessive, escapist behaviour, though. It's just not "good" purely because it involves reading, is what I meant.
 

Salomé

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Exactly this. It's mind-blowingly obvious to me that depressed people will spend more time online (assuming they use the internet at all normally). It's an easy escape from real life. I'm thinking of Wow and similar here too.
Mildly depressed to slightly disgruntled, maybe.
"Severely" depressed? I doubt it. Do people have any concept of what severe depression looks like? It's an effort to run a comb through your hair, you're not gonna be spending hours a day chatting online.
 

Thalassa

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yeah, that's true in some ways, but you could rationalize alcohol in the same way (helps you socialize, fun experiences, whatever) and the kind of internet that becomes excessive isn't usually the educational type. I suppose you could say you could learn social skills from wow, but I'd argue that (in most cases) it's outweighed by keeping you from developing real social skills which include body language and so on. And in my experience it tends to make social anxiety worse, not better, because the fear grows as you avoid "real life" social contact, so you don't get the chance to learn that it's not so bad.

but yeah, it's better than say, crystal meth, or heroin. It's just not "good" purely because it involves reading, is what I meant.

Yeah...I wouldn't compare the Internet as a whole to drugs or alcohol, I think that's an exaggeration. I think there's a higher chance that Internet nerds are making a better use of their time, though they *could be* porn addicts, compulsive gamblers, or obsessed with WoW...that doesn't mean that's what all people on the Internet are doing. People who are drinking heavily and taking hard drugs usually are putting their lives, health, emotions, and intellect in much more danger.

You can read novels on the Internet, do math, read history, and research any number of things, as well as socializing with like-minded people. Apparently you don't suffer from social anxiety yourself, and don't comprehend how crippling that can be for some people, especially if they have agoraphobia, and Internet socializing really can help people, and I stand by that statement.

It depends on how it is used, hence my original comment of "I love how they lump the rest of us in with the porn addicts, et al."
 

ajblaise

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What's considered excessive internet use today will be normal internet use in a few years...

You can link excessive <insert word> use with a lot of things, depression being one of them, so I'm not surprised.
 

Salomé

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It depends on how it is used, hence my original comment of "I love how they lump the rest of us in with the porn addicts, et al."

I think you misread it. It's quite explicitly talking about "excessive" use which amounts to addiction.
Addiction is never healthy.
 

rav3n

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I'd be curious what's considered excessive use and if the same amount of time spent reading books would also be considered excessive use.
 

ajblaise

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I'd be curious what's considered excessive use and if the same amount of time spent reading books would also be considered excessive use.

Yeah, and extreme reading always seems to get a free pass. But extreme internet use.... it's about porn, gambling, FarmVille, dating... "you need help!" which I guess is fair. But most of my internet time is spent reading and typing.
 

Thalassa

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Yeah, and extreme reading always seems to get a free pass. But extreme internet use.... it's about porn, gambling, FarmVille, dating... "you need help!" which I guess is fair. But most of my internet time is spent reading and typing.

Yeah - I thought about this too. Before the Internet, I just walked around with my nose in a book (sometimes literally, walking with a book from room to room) and lived in my head anyway.

It comes naturally to me to read, write, and discuss. I learn things all the time on-line from discussions with other people. I'm sure if the Internet is used that way it's actually good for your brain - you know, the way that people who do puzzles and read for pleasure tend to stave off things like dementia and alzheimer's longer in old age.

This is a case of Ss judging Ns, or maybe Es judging Is.

Most likely ESxx judging everyone else by their standard of normal.
 

Salomé

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I'd be curious what's considered excessive use and if the same amount of time spent reading books would also be considered excessive use.
You sound like someone in denial.
 

Thalassa

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It kind of sucks though if you make friends and don't meet them or it's too long distance to meet enough. This applies to this site, but it's applied to me before elsewhere.

It's kind of a "lousy investment" if you think about it. As cool as some people are.

Hmm, I think I'm depressed now. :coffee:

I don't see it as a lousy investment at all. I learn from each person I interact with, some people have taught me so much. Plus, I meet a lot of the people that I really enjoy talking to on-line, and some of the people I talk to are my friends and family from IRL anyway.

It doesn't depress me at all.
 

Randomnity

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Apparently you don't suffer from social anxiety yourself, and don't comprehend how crippling that can be for some people, especially if they have agoraphobia, and Internet socializing really can help people, and I stand by that statement.
Part of my comment was drawn from my experience with my (fairly mild) social anxiety, but yes I'm not in the camp of people who can't leave the house. Still, it's been enough to seriously affect my life at times.

I have improved dramatically when I've been forced to do activities that I fear, and letting me follow my fear and hide from people hasn't been productive. The biggest example is school presentations, which I was previously so afraid to do that I got zero every time we had to do it in high school because I refused. Now after forced and highly unpleasant practice with presentations, it doesn't cause nearly as much anxiety (I would say I'm nearly at the "normal" anxiety level now, which is a huge improvement for me).

Another example is that after being forced to get a job by being threatened with being thrown out of the house, I got a job as a cashier which did directly reduce my anxiety with strangers, though it's still there even today (before that I was too afraid to submit an application because I didn't want to talk to a stranger there, despite really needing money and wanting a job). Before that I spent a LOT of time playing video games online and chatting with people there (I was a depressed and self-harming teenager at the time, actually, but that's not my point). I spent all my non-school hours chatting to people online and my social skills didn't improve at all as far as I could tell. It would be a little different for somewhere like here where "Fe" is a little more enforced, but still you're not going to fix the fear by avoiding it, even if you do learn things. Unfortunately mental disorders, and thinking like that, are very difficult to overcome by rational thought, no matter how educated it is.

Anyway that's TMI about me all to say that I'm not completely talking out of my ass here (just mostly ;) ), although I'd agree with you that severe social anxiety is different and is probably more difficult to treat with exposure therapy. Anti-anxiety meds are probably needed there at a bare minimum. We're talking about depressed people in this thread though, which isn't the same thing. Plenty of depressed people have no social anxiety problems, although certainly it's likely to make these problems worse.

---

I agree with you that it's all about how it's used, although I'd stretch that more to "why" it's used. Spending hours a day, totally fine. Spending hours a day to escape your sad reality when your kids are crying and the stove is on fire and you haven't showered in three days and there's an inch of grime on the counter and you have three projects due at work, not so much.

Can I just emphasize again that I'm not talking about large amounts of internet use intrinsically? You seem to be responding as if I meant that, but I would be a severe offender myself, in that case. :D I specifically mean using it addictively, to escape reality, like the OP sort of implies.
 

Thalassa

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Part of my comment was drawn from my experience with my (fairly mild) social anxiety, but yes I'm not in the camp of people who can't leave the house. I have improved dramatically when I've been forced to do activities that I fear, and letting me follow my fear and hide from people hasn't been productive. The biggest example is school presentations, which I was previously so afraid to do that I got zero every time we had to do it in high school because I refused. Now after forced and highly unpleasant practice with presentations, it doesn't cause nearly as much anxiety (I would say I'm nearly at the "normal" anxiety level now, which is a huge improvement for me).

Another example is that after being forced to get a job by being threatened with being thrown out of the house, I got a job as a cashier which did directly reduce my anxiety with strangers, though it's still there even today (before that I was too afraid to submit an application because I didn't want to talk to a stranger there, despite really needing money and wanting a job). Before that I spent a LOT of time playing video games online and chatting with people there (I was a depressed and self-harming teenager at the time, actually, but that's not my point). I spent all my non-school hours chatting to people online and my social skills didn't improve at all as far as I could tell. It would be a little different for somewhere like here where "Fe" is a little more enforced, but still you're not going to fix the fear by avoiding it, even if you do learn things. Unfortunately mental disorders and thinking like that is very difficult to overcome by rational thought, no matter how educated it is.

Indeed. That's why I went to my therapist this very morning. But I will say that self-help is extremely beneficial and huge part of anyone's journey in overcoming issues or learning to live with illnesses or disorders.

Anyway that's TMI about me all to say that I'm not completely talking out of my ass here (just mostly ;) ), although I'd agree with you that severe social anxiety is different and is probably more difficult to treat with exposure therapy. Anti-anxiety meds are probably needed there at a bare minimum. We're talking about depressed people in this thread though, which isn't the same thing. Plenty of depressed people have no social anxiety problems, although certainly it's likely to make these problems worse.

---

I agree with you that it's all about how it's used, although I'd stretch that more to "why" it's used. Spending hours a day, totally fine. Spending hours a day to escape your sad reality when your kids are crying and the stove is on fire and you haven't showered in three days and there's an inch of grime on the counter and you have three projects due at work, not so much.

Can I just emphasize again that I'm not talking about large amounts of internet use intrinsically? You seem to be responding as if I meant that, but I would be a severe offender myself, in that case. :D I specifically mean using it addictively, to escape reality, like the OP describes.

I totally agree with the bolded. I didn't even think of it terms of not bathing, your stove being on fire, etc...I guess it's like those messed up people who let their baby die because they were playing video games. So I do agree. I see your point.
 

rav3n

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Yeah, and extreme reading always seems to get a free pass. But extreme internet use.... it's about porn, gambling, FarmVille, dating... "you need help!" which I guess is fair. But most of my internet time is spent reading and typing.
It does depend on how you use it.

You sound like someone in denial.
Answer my question.
 

Lily flower

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I see this as a chicken/egg issue. People who are intimidated by social situations are more likely to seek out social comfort online. So it may be better to say that people who are depressed spend more time on the internet.
 
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