A recently released report from the Tel Aviv University in Israel claims that internet addiction affects up to 10 percent of all internet users and states that the affliction can be as damaging as a gambling habit.
The Israeli National Institute of Mental Health Web site says obsessive-compulsive disorder is characterized by a constant urge to indulge in certain behaviors to the point of affecting day-to-day life.
The behaviors may range from excessive hand washing to feeling the need to be online all day.
Dr. Pinhas Dannon, a psychiatrist at the Tel Aviv University Be'er Ya'acov Mental Health Center, said he wants Internet addiction to be taken more seriously.
He said he believes the mental affliction should be on par with the more extreme addiction disorders, like kleptomania or
gambling addiction.
"Internet addiction is not manifesting itself as an 'urge.' It's more than that. It's a deep 'craving,'" Dannon said in the press release. "And if we don't make the change in the way we classify Internet addiction, we won't be able to treat it in the proper way." Dannon said there are two age groups at the highest risk of developing Internet addiction: teenagers and men and women in their mid-50s who suffer from loneliness after their children have left for college or their own lives.
Symptoms of Internet addiction disorder include loss of sleep or employment over Internet usage, anxiety when away from the computer and isolation from family and friends and deep depression, according to the press release. Dannon said he and his colleagues have submitted their findings to the Journal of Clinical Pharmacology and plan to present the study at the annual meeting of the National Gambling Council in Las Vegas.
Internet addiction is an inevitable product of modernization, Dannon said. "They are just like anyone else who is addicted to coffee, exercise, or talking on their cellular phone," Dannon said of people with Internet addictions. "As the times change, so do our addictions."
