Internet Addiction Official Mental Illness Edit
Compulsive-Impulsive Disorder

I may soon be officially classified with a brain illness…  According to the editorial of the latest issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry: Internet addiction—including “excessive gaming, sexual pre-occupations and e-mail/text messaging”—is a common compulsive-impulsive disorder that should be added to psychiatry’s official guidebook of mental disorders.

According to Dr. Jerald Block, a psychiatrist at the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, similar to other addicts, users experience cravings, urges, withdrawal and tolerance, requiring more and better equipment and software, or more and more hours online. Relapse rates are high and some people may need psychoactive medications or hospitalization.

When you need help with your web addiction, there are already resources to help out:

PageAddict - Monitor your Internet Addiction

This Free Firefox extension can give you a summary of your daily online activity, just install the PageAddict extension and surf the net, if you want to see the results, just return to PageAddict.com. There you’ll get the time spent at each site, percentages of overall time and the option to apply… [More]

Chinese Internet Addict Camp - Rehab For Web Addicts (VIDEO)

It was bound to happen—people are going to start checking into rehabilitation clinics to battle their internet addictions. A trial camp for youth and teens who are addicted to surfing is going on in China right now. Parents who are concerned about their young weboholics can send them to this with… [More]

Internet Addict Camp (Part II) - South Korean Weboholics (GALLERY)

South Korea is likely the world’s most wired nation, and today’s kids have grown up online, networked and broadbanded. Just about every street corner has a “PC bang,” or internet parlors where kids surf online. Growing numbers of kids are skipping school to be online and an estimated 30 percen… [More]

Internet Addictions and Gaming Obsessions Causing Deaths

Internet addiction and gaming obsession are real problems in our technological age. In fact, these issues are such big problems that people are actually dropping dead. There are actually treatment centres being set up to deal with the growing problem if internet addiction - counselling and treatment… [More]