I think the best example of my problem is simply the fact that I’m writing this at
College Humor, The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, The New York Times (online), Slashdot, Facebook, Wikipedia and many other web sites are the time wasters that push my real work back until ungodly hours and ultimately lead to this:
(Although that was last year; I’m no longer on Red Bull, now it’s just coffee)
Caplan’s definition of Problematic Internet Use is practically a definition of me:
Maladaptive cognitions and behaviors involving Internet use that result in negative academic, professional, and social
This is where Caplan’s theory is dead on with my case of PIU. Often my academics suffer greatly because of my procrastination, my social life can suffer when I need the weekend to recuperate, and beyond Caplan’s definition, my health can suffer (and has) because of the lack of sleep I get. All of these consequences can be traced back to Problematic Internet Use. Caplan goes on to define two components of PIU: excessive use, which applies to my case because I generally waste far more time than I ever intended, and compulsive use. I can remember multiple situations when I’ve opened an internet browser to check Blackboard and start my homework, but a link on my homepage caught my eye, and all of the sudden I’m 27 clicks removed from my homepage and 90 minutes have gone by. Although no one likes to think that they aren’t in control, compulsive use is definitely applicable in my situation.
However not all of Caplan’s theory applies to my case. Strangely enough, my Problematic Internet Use does not require any interaction with other people. Caplan’s Psychosocial theory depends entirely on the interactive component of online activity. What is interesting about my problem is that although it does not depend on interaction with other people, it is all about my need for new information and media to keep me satisfied. We all find ourselves regularly checking the news feed on Facebook, but do you also find yourself checking who died recently, or reading the latest Mac rumors, or browsing the crazy Halloween costumes that college students came up with this year? To me this stuff is like a drug, and although my Problematic Internet Use is not a psychosocial issue, it is a real problem none the less.
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9: A Wiki-ddiction
9 | Remember, remember the Fifth of November
4 comments:
Great picture!
Anyways, your discussion of what we can term "feed" sites, that act as shifters through the mass of Internet content to find the few golden (that's debatable of course) nuggets, keys on one of my biggest griefs with our classes discussion of PIU. While Caplan relates that pyschosocial problems can often lead people to online use, the particular ones that are most highly spoken of relate to interpersonal relationships. While some people may feel deficiences in their real world social skills, its not necessarily social problems that drive people online and into situations in which they derive PIU. While we haven't delved deeply into addiction and while I do agree that pre-disposition for addictive behavior is a factor, I'm not sure that what Caplan and others have targeted is the end-all-be-all (though, I can refer to the end of his paper which notes that his study was only preliminary). In any case, as you have pointed out, it's not always a persons' problems with social settings offline that drives them to pursue detrimental activities online. Thanks, for pointing that out!
Very enjoyable post! I think the form of PIU you discussed is probably very prevalent, especially among college students. Additionally, I think this form might have less to do with the internet itself and more to do with an overall propensity for procrastination. It's also fairly easy to get wrapped up in flipping through TV channels instead of studying, but the internet provides an even more personalized mechanism for "wasting time." With such a vast store of up-to-the-minute information, it's easy to find things you're interested in, which are linked to other things you're interested in, which are also linked.... Who wouldn't be drawn in? I think in many cases, people have to force themselves to log off. However, when the motivation to do work is not strong enough to outweigh the internet's entertainment capacity, many people would continue surfing the net, most of them showing no signs of social incompetence.
Hey Gerard,
Great post - you did a really good job describing your problematic internet use. It seems that you have fallen into the trap of what Wallace would call Operant Conditioning, in that your procrastination rewards you, in the short-term, with a study break and the opportunity to blow off some stress, which makes the behavior more difficult to get rid of. I completely understand where you are coming from with this problem, as I have often given in to online procrastination when I had more important things to do. However, as much as I may hate it, the 5 GB limit at Cornell helps me to think twice about visiting youtube or collegehumor because of their high relative bandwidth costs.
Your post got me wondering whether our generation is at a disadvantage from previous generations of college students because of the nearly infinite amount of entertainment at our fingertips that is so easily accessible on the internet. This accessibility makes it harder for us maintain control over our procrastination, whereas previous generations did not have this sort of ever-present temptation. I wonder what future generations of college students will be like, especially as internet speeds increase and HD-quality video becomes more and more prevalent online.
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