According to a study by the University of Chicago, published by the journal Psychological Science, the impulses that we find most difficult to resist have to do with the need to look at our cell phone, lie on the couch, check email or take a look at updates from social networks. The desire to access Twiiter or Instagram was positioned as the most difficult desire to resist and the easiest to satisfy . Tobacco and alcohol, despite being highly addictive substances, generate a much weaker desire in comparison.
The excess of the internet, then, causes alterations similar to the abuse of other drugs . Being connected to the network for 18 hours a day has a similar effect to smoking a marijuana cigarette or injecting cocaine , according to another study published in the journal Plos One that was led by Hao Lei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. To conduct the study, they relied on neuroimaging of the brains of twelve adolescents suffering from Internet Addiction Syndrome .
Behavioral addictions
If many apps , especially the lootboxes of some video games, are so addictive, it is because they activate the same neural circuits that slot machines wake up . Behind this addiction is dopamine, one of the neurotransmitters responsible for the addictive effect that various drugs have on us, and which is also related to addiction to mobile phones, the internet, apps , video games or even series of TV.
But, while it is true that substance addictions and behavioral addictions are very similar to each other, activating the same brain regions, behavioral addictions are composed of six distinctive traits , as described by Adam Alter in his Irresistible book: “attractive targets just out of reach; positive, irresistible and unpredictable feedback; a sense of progress and gradual improvement; actions whose difficulty increases over time; unresolved tensions that demand to be solved; and strong social connections ”.
In other words, features that the digital environment can particularly exploit . Thus, for example, gamers or video game fans can spend hours playing because each and every one of these traits is exploited, even forming solid social bonds that unite them with other players. Facebook “likes” or Instagram hearts offer similar feelings.
Therefore, a recent study indicated that up to 40% of the population suffers from Internet-related addictions. 80% of adolescents look at their mobile phone at least once an hour . If in 2008 we dedicated an average of 18 minutes a day to this device, in 2015 we already spent 2 hours and 48 minutes a day.
If something positive can be extracted from this capacity for persuasion and control that many Internet applications exert over us, it is that perhaps they can be used for more positive things , as Alter concludes: “If application designers are able to convince us to invest more time and money on a smartphone game, perhaps policy experts can also encourage us to save more for retirement or donate more to charities. ”
