David N. Greenfield - Overcoming Internet Addiction For Dummies

Every accomplishment starts with a goal, followed by an assessment of where you are, and a plan for where you want to be:

1 Do you spend more time online on your screen devices (computer, laptop, tablet, smartphone, or smart TV) than you realize?

2 Do you mindlessly pass time on a regular basis by staring at your smartphone, tablet, computer, or smart TV, even when you know there might be better or more productive things to do?

3 Do you seem to lose track of time when on any of your screen devices?

4 Are you spending more time with “virtual friends” as opposed to real people nearby? (Obviously, during the COVID pandemic this is a difficult question.)

5 Has the amount of time you spend on your smartphone or the Internet been increasing?

6 Do you secretly wish you could be a little less wired or connected to your screen devices?

7 Do you regularly sleep with your smartphone under your pillow or next to your bed?

8 Do you find yourself viewing and answering texts, tweets, snaps, posts, comments, likes, IMs, DMs, and emails at all hours of the day and night — even when it means interrupting other things you are doing?

9 Do you text, email, tweet, snap, IM, DM, post, comment, or surf while driving or doing other similar activities that require your focused attention and concentration?

10 Do you at times feel your use of technology decreases your productivity?

11 Do you feel uncomfortable when you accidentally leave your phone or other Internet screen device in your car or at home, if you have no service, or if it is broken?

12 Do you feel reluctant to be without your smartphone or other screen device, even for a short time?

13 When you leave the house, do you typically have your smartphone or other screen device with you?

14 When you eat meals, is your smartphone always part of the table setting?

15 Do you find yourself distracted by your smartphone or other screen devices?

If you answer yes to 50 percent (7 or 8) or more of these questions, then you may want to examine your Internet and screen use.

Here’s an important disclaimer: It should be noted that no medical or psychiatric diagnosis can be made solely from a written test or screening tool. These Internet and screen addiction diagnostic criteria are intended for educational and informational purposes only and are not a substitute for professional medical advice. If you are concerned about your smartphone, Internet, or screen use, you may want to consult with a licensed mental health or addiction professional with expertise in Internet and technology addiction.

The main thing to look out for is an overall lack of awareness of how much time you are spending on your screens. The more time, the more likely your life will be out of balance. The content or app is not the most important thing here; rather, it is the amount of time you are diverting from balanced real-time living. The power of the Internet, in part, comes from its ability to dissociate you from real life and to become a digital drug by impacting dopamine levels in your brain.

You cannot change anything in your life unless you have honest self-appraisal and feedback. The problem with addiction is that often, self cannot accurately see self, and people have a great capacity for denial and self-deception when engaging in addictive behaviors that impact their brain reward centers.

Recovery always begins with honest self-evaluation, often with some objective data to help you accurately see what you’re doing online. With substance as well as behavioral addiction, there are well-established methods for assessing overuse and life impacts from an addiction. However, there is no simple answer for how much is too much, nor is there an easy fix. As I note throughout this book, addiction is complex and involves mind, body, and spirit — impacting many aspects of your functioning; that said, everyone has a different bottom line where they can no longer ignore the fact that their screen addiction is hurting their life in some way. The following sections introduce two options for recovery: self-help and professional help.

One thing you do have with Internet addiction is a digital footprint; that is, everything you do online and on your smartphone can be tracked, and you can see how much time you spend, what websites and apps you use, and what content areas you seem to have a problem with. This feedback can be critical in helping you start the process of recovery by seeing what you’re doing, much like keeping a record of the foods you eat when attempting to eat better or lose weight. There are many aftermarket apps and programs that can record, track, block, and monitor your Internet and screen use. Most cellphone manufacturers and service providers have apps that offer a great deal of detailed information on your use. Several companies also produce software that you or an IT professional can install on all your screen devices that can give you accurate and detailed data, which provides you with total usage information and any problem content areas (see Chapter 11for more options regarding self-help resources).

Don’t be surprised when you look at your usage information and find that it is much greater than you recall it being or that you were aware of. This is normal and is part of that dissociation and time distortion that I talk about earlier in this chapter. It’s essential that you get accurate feedback about your use; otherwise, you’ll be unable to take control of your screen time.

Self-help options (covered in Chapter 12) have always been a substantive part of any addiction recovery and treatment plan. The most well-known is Alcoholics Anonymous, but there are 12-step and recovery/support programs for nearly every addiction; there are even specific support groups for pornography and sex addiction, including Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous, Sex Addicts Anonymous, and Sexaholics Anonymous. There are also many support and self-help groups for Internet and technology addiction. Groups like Game Quitters, OLG-Anon (On-Line Gamers Anonymous), and others that focus on video gaming and other forms of screen use can be useful, but beware that many of these groups are themselves online. Some might argue that this defeats the purpose, but my experience suggests that some help is always better than no help, even if it’s online. (COVID also gave us new reliance on the utility of telemedicine mental health and addiction treatment.)

Self-help books and resources can be invaluable in making desired changes in any behavior or addiction. When I first started my work in Internet addiction in the late 1990s, only one self-help book ( Caught in the Net, published in 1998 by Dr. Kimberly Young) was available, and my book Virtual Addiction was the second, published in 1999. Now, literally dozens of books and resources have been written, and a great deal of medical and scientific research has been conducted on the subject. We know a lot more about this new addiction than we did 25 years ago (see Chapter 12for more on self-help strategies).