Should Internet
Addiction Disorder (IAD) Be In DSM-5?
Mohamad Farhan Huszaimi Bin M. Pajar
January 2017
Internet is necessary for survival
nowadays for almost everybody including children because the internet is used
for businesses, communications, games, and politics. Hannah O.Price says in his
"Phenomenology of Internet Addiction" article that, "Internet became
essential to the daily lives of more than one billion people" (85), which
indicates that nowadays almost everything is depending on the internet. For
instance, if there are no internet connections at certain places in Los
Angeles, people in those places will suffer because it is hard for them to do
business and get crucial current updates such as warning about earthquakes or
even terrorists' attack in Paris. People in those places might have problems to
buy something online or to get an online education, if they are taking online
classes either from other countries or local colleges. It is clearly shown that
the internet is a really important tool nowadays for everybody. On the other
side, internet use also might have some negative impacts such as internet
addiction. Many people do not know the term Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD)
because IAD is actually a new type of psychiatric disorder under addiction
category which is faced by many people especially in Korea and China (Price),
consciously or unconsciously, after the great invention of internet around 1983
by Robert E. Kahn and Vint Cerf.
The term Internet Addiction Disorder
was first suggested by Ivan Goldberg in 1995 (Price, 86-87). IAD draws a
descriptive picture of the disorder based on the DSM-4-R criteria for alcohol or drug dependence. Kimberly Young, a
psychologist, used the term IAD in 1996 during a conference of the American
Psychological Association in Toronto (Price, 86). Because IAD was first
introduced in 1995, scientists, physicians, and psychologists are making
further study of IAD and still debating until now whether IAD should be in DSM-5 or not. DSM-5 stands for Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorder, fifth edition (Ko and Yen,
1411). DSM is used as a formal manual
and guide for all psychiatrists, and psychologists around the world to diagnose
psychiatric patients. DSM contains
every type of psychological disorder, symptoms of the particular disorders, and
specific treatments can be done for each disorder based on their level of
severity. IAD currently is still considered as an informal mental disorder
because there are many gaps of information and problems associated with
determining IAD clearly. Some of the problems are scientists (psychologists,
and psychiatrists) do not have a clear definition of IAD; scientists and
therapists have problems to determine the severity of the disorder, and how it
departs from normality; and the criteria should be determined based on the
intensity and frequency of symptoms (Ko and Yen, 1411). However, problems with
determining IAD do not mean that IAD cannot be detected and treated like
Postman says "As a true-blue American who has imbibed the unshaken belief
that where there is a problem, there must be a solution." (158). Although
IAD sometimes sounds nonsensical and unrealistic because people think that it
should not exist, it does not mean people should just ignore it. As Ko et al
say, "Just because [it is] difficult to define Internet addiction [does
not] mean it [is not] an ‘emerging epidemic'" (1411). Thus, there must be
some solutions to solve IAD.
First of all, scientists are still
debating about Internet Addiction Disorder issues and look at IAD as a serious
psychiatric problem. Some people think that IAD should not even exist because
nowadays internet is a really important tool for survival and they, people who
oppose classifying IAD as a psychiatric disorder, say that spending more time
on surfing internet is just a new culture of people in the 21st century. On the
other side, scientists are still discussing about whether IAD should be in DSM-5 or not because it has many bad
effects on a person's mental health especially, physical and social life. Since
IAD is really a problem for people in general, IAD should be in the DSM-5 because it leads a person to an
unhealthy mental health, bad social lifestyle, and bad for the person's
physical health.
Internet Addiction Disorder should
be in the
DSM-5 because it causes a
person to have mental disorders. Price says, "Cyber addiction shares some
characteristics with the other forms of dependence [such as] less of control,
inability to reduce addictive consumption [,] and feeling of intense
pleasure" (87). People that have IAD are less likely to do healthy
activities that can relax their mind such as exercising and talking with other
people. Scientists are frequently relating IAD with attention-deficit or hyperactivity
disorder, known as ADHD, (Yen et al, 187), which is a type of mental disorder
under stress and depression category. ADHD is experienced by most people with
IAD due to extremely high level of stress. People with ADHD will find it is
hard for them to face any challenges in their life because of the
uncontrollable stress level. Based on the research done by Yen et al, adult
ADHD was associated with internet addiction (189). The result from studies by
Yen et al clearly indicates that Internet addiction might cause a normal person
to suffer from ADHD in the future if they are having internet addiction
problem. At the same time, ADHD will also lead a person to a terrible academic
and job performance. "Adolescents with internet addiction usually suffer
from problems with their daily routines, school performance, family
relationships, and mood." (Yen et al, 9). People with ADHD will find it is
hard for them to focus on something such as school and jobs, because they will
always think about internet and they will feel depressed if they do not have
internet even though it is just for an hour. People with ADHD will pay little
attention to the negative consequences of heavy internet use (Yen et al, 189).
Some of the symptoms of IAD are excessive use of internet (often loss of the
sense of time), feeling of craving when they stop surfing internet, feeling of
stress and depression, tolerance (increased connection time even more), and
relapse (an earlier addictive activity to recur) (Price, 86). The result of
research made by Yen et al also indicates that people with Internet Addiction
had a higher level of hostility, depression, phobic anxiety, and additional
symptoms, and a higher level of anxiety (13). Yen et al also say,
"Internet addiction or substance use in adolescents was associated with
more severe psychiatric symptoms. The symptoms lead a person to be an
aggressive person towards other people due to the depressed mood and ADHD. Price
says, "Web suffers having mood disorder, anxiety, [and] depression"
(88). Thus, internet addiction may cause psychiatric symptoms. These negative
outcomes show that IAD should be in
DSM-5.
Other than that, IAD should also be
in DSM-5 because there are lots of
children are having IAD. Psychologists, and psychiatrists should prevent IAD
from happening among children because IAD will lead to psychiatric problems
among children and teenagers which will affect their bright future drastically.
IAD is also a big problem facing by many undergraduate students like what Yen
et al say, "Previous reports demonstrate that 8% to 13% of undergraduates
are addicted to the Internet, which has impaired psychological well-being, peer
and family interactions, and academic performance" (187). It is obviously
shows that IAD leads to many negative effects in a person's mental health.
Since IAD affects people's mental health negatively, IAD cannot be considered
as an "evolved" culture in the 21st century, which the oppositions
(people who disagree to put IAD in DSM-5
and think Internet addiction is not a serious problem), think. A mental
disorder such as ADHD should not be considered as a culture for people in 21st
century. It is true as what Postman says, "[Everybody] is Marxist, for we
believe nothing if not history is moving us toward some preordained paradise
and that technology is the force behind that movement" (158). In
conclusion, because Internet addiction disorder leads to unhealthy mental
health such as having ADHD, IAD should be a formal psychiatric disorder and be
in the DSM-5 so that people with IAD
will get diagnosed, treated, and could live happily in the future.
Then, Internet Addiction Disorder
should be in
DSM-5 because IAD causes
a person to have social problems. People with IAD will usually have antisocial
personalities such as be aggressive towards other people due to their unhealthy
mental health. People with IAD will have a social problem because of the
anxiety. As a research made by Yen et al found that logistic regression
demonstrated that high social phobic anxiety is associated with internet
addiction (14). People with social phobic anxiety will find it hard to go out
and hang out with other people like what normal people do because they scared
to socialize. One of the symptoms for social phobic anxiety is isolation from
friends and family, ("Computer/ Internet Addiction Symptoms"). This
insularity may prevent them from coping with their problems (Yen et al, 14). Lack
of person to person contact might cause a trouble to the person when he or she
is facing problems in real life. Some of the IAD people are even scared to meet
with the other people due to the phobia, known as social phobia, and low
self-esteem (Price, 88). People with IAD are lack of confident when talking to
other people or when they are doing social activities such as playing soccer
together and walk at a park with friend. For instance, a person with IAD scare
to hang out and talk to someone because they think the person who they communicate
with will harm them.
It is also hard for IAD people to
share something they feel with another person because they feel awkward of
sharing their feeling and talking to other people about anything related to
humanity or life issues such as marriage. For example, if a guy with IAD fall in
love with a girl, then the guy feels jealous when he saw that girl hugs someone
else, that guy will having problem to understand and handle the feeling of envy
and love. People with IAD might do something unwise such as murder their crush
due to the feeling of jealous. Indeed, it is true people can socialize by using
internet, but long exposure on internet will increase the chance for a person
to get IAD. Price cites "Subjects using Internet for its social functions
are more exposed to addiction" (89). The point here is that it is
different if the person get social on internet and in real life (face-to-face
interaction) because if the person social through the internet, they might playing
games, or read some articles which will lead them to internet addiction. Once
they are having internet addiction, it will be hard for them to communicate
with other people again because of social phobia and low self-esteem.
Furthermore, society might also be
affected badly if most of the population in a particular country have IAD.
Price writes, "the cyber addiction is a true society' problem whose
frightening consequences led many countries to work out a prevention of the risks"
(91). People are worried about IAD will cause negative outcomes to a country
because the higher probability of people with IAD to face physical problems
such as losing jobs, and low job quality; and social problems such as divorce.
These physical and social problems will cause a huge trouble to a country's
politics, economy, and social environment. For example, people with IAD will
have a high probability of losing job because it is hard for them to maintain
high job performance. Lose jobs and terrible job performance in any field, such
as business field especially, due to IAD will lead to negative impacts on
communities, and countries' economic. People with IAD also tend to do crime
because their mental state is not normal and less humanity among IAD people.
Besides, divorce will also cause many problems to the communities. Hence,
because Internet Addiction Disorder leads to bad social effects on a person,
community, and country, IAD should be prevented and people with IAD should be
diagnosed in order to have a better surrounding community, which means that IAD
should be in DSM-5.
Besides that, Internet Addiction
Disorder should also be in
DSM-5 because
IAD leads a person to poor physical health due to most IAD people spend their
time in front of computer instead of doing something benefits for their
physical health such as eat healthy foods, and go to the gym. Nowadays, there
are only certain countries, which are South Korea and China, considering IAD as
a general health problem. South Korea considered addiction to Internet was a
serious public health problem (Yen et al, 87). Some of the physical effects are
backache, headaches, excessive weight gain or loss, disturbances in sleep,
carpal tunnel syndrome, blurred or strained vision, ("Computer/ Internet Addiction
Symptoms"). People with IAD might have backache because the long period of
hunchbacked position during sitting in front of computer. Then IAD people
usually have blurred or strained vision because of the long exposure to the
screen of the computer. There are certain wavelengths that will corrode the
eyes of computer users. Blurred vision might be the result of continuous eyes
corrosion due to long exposure in front of computer, television or any
smartphone screens. Severe headache is due to the lack of brain rest. Human's
brains need to get rest after doing a consistent, and long activities such as
surfing internet, if not, some part of the brain will start to damage and cause
headache.
Other than that, people who have
Internet addiction disorder tend to have cardiovascular disorder such as
asthma. Yen et al found that people with IAD tend to have cardiovascular
disorder other than
depression and hostility (649). Clearly that IAD also
causes a person to have an unhealthy physical circumstance. Yen et al say,
"Problem behavior that adolescents are facing would result in similar
health compromising outcomes." (10). Unfortunately, there are 20 to 24%
children in South Korea need hospitalization (Yen et al, 87) because of their
poor physical health which requires doctors attention. For instance, many of
students in college or university have high lens power for their glasses due to
the long exposure to computer, either due to study or play games. However, most
frequent damages include sleep, and sight problems (Yen et al, 89). There was a
case of IAD that causes death due to the lack of hygiene (Yen et al, 89). Many
of these results were found in Asia and people in the United States might not
think IAD will happen to them, but people should take lessons from the outcome
of the result in researches. The other most frequent effect of Internet
Addiction Disorder on physical health is excessive gain or loss weight.
Excessive gain and loss weight might happen because people with IAD do not feel
hungry when they are online or they are always hungry when they are online.
Most people will eat unhealthy food such as chocolate bars, and fast foods. For
instance, if a person is playing an online game with his friends, the person
will probably just grab chocolate bars for the whole day instead of fish and
chips because he or she wants to play games while eating. Thus, because
Internet Addiction Disorder causes many negative effects on a person's physical
health, IAD should be in
DSM-5 so
that these negative physical effects can be healed earlier before it is too
late and might cause fatality.
Internet Addiction Disorder should
be considered as one of the psychiatric disorders and should be in DSM-5 because people with IAD have an
unhealthy mental health, lots of social problems, and poor physical health.
People, in general, should be concerned about Internet addiction issues because
it may cause many negative outcomes to a person, community, and country. IAD is
a serious disorder that should be diagnosed by trained psychologists and
psychiatrists around the world. Besides that, parents should keep an eye on
their children’s activity on Internet so that Internet addiction can be
prevented. The NGO's company should also make up campaigns to reduce and stop
Internet addiction in community for a brighter future. To prevent the disorder
is way better than to heal the disorder. The negative outcomes of Internet
addiction might not show after a few months, but it will show after a few
years. Hopefully people; scientists, politicians, and general people; will take
Internet addiction disorder seriously and try to prevent it from happening to
have a better future for ourselves, our community, and our country.
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