In the Internet We Trust

While technology has helped a lot in advance mankind, it also spawned diseases in the person, in his mind, body and even soul. The growth of internet technology did the same, bringing a new set of maladies that psychiatrists called the internet addiction disorder (IAD). In this article you will find specific symptoms studied scientifically.

THE Farmer’s Almanac, published in 1978, has this curious entry: “To err is human, but to really foul things up requires a computer.” Well, this can mean a lot of things. But the same message gets through though—computer can mess things up.

The Philippines has a low penetration rate for personal computers, estimated at less than 10 percent of the total population as early as 2004. As of 2000, internet users run around two millions.

But driven by the growth of online gaming in Internet cafes, barely 10 years later, users totaled 29.7 million, says the International Telecommunication Union, a United Nations agency for information and communication technology issues. That’s almost 15 times more than in 2000. This is a worldwide phenomenon though.

Inevitably it brought an increase in its problematic use, now called the internet addiction disorder (IAD). IAD has become a serious mental health problem worldwide. It had earned the distinction of being included in the bible of the psychiatric profession, the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorder (DSM), in its fifth edition coming out in May 2013.

Researches looking into this disorder reported many consequences of IAD, such as... [Read more.]

This article appears in SunStar Cebu newspaper on 15 June 2011.

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