Social media addiction: the abuse of the virtual

In psychology and mental health in general, the concept of addiction is very focused on chemical dependence on substances; in fact, in the main diagnostic manuals the only case of addiction to something other than a drug That is mentioned is that of gambling, one in which you cannot stop playing games of chance.

However, outside of the clinical field there are other conceptions about what is understood by "addiction", and these they tend to change more rapidly than the more or less rigid categories reached through consensus scientific. This is especially noticeable in the field of new technologies, in which we are already beginning to talk about a relatively new phenomenon: social media addiction. And the fact is that the generalization of Internet use has its advantages, but also its risks.

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What is addiction to social networks?

As its name suggests, addiction to social networks is a dependency relationship that someone develops towards these virtual platforms of interaction with others, although in reality there is something more than this. People who are obsessed with social networks do not think all the time about the pleasure that the use of the social network makes them feel, but about what is achieved through that platform.

That means that the use of these services does not generate a "peak of pleasure", but what is gained is rather the fact of avoiding disappearing from the social map. Normally, you are not looking for a reward, but you are trying to prevent missing events, not finding out about certain news, etc. It is something reminiscent of the phenomenon of FOMO syndrome (fear of missing out), with which this kind of addiction is related.

On the other hand, it must be taken into account that addiction to social networks is not simply the creation of a dependency on the use of computers. In fact, if something now characterizes social networks are everywhere: tablets, smartphones, PCs and other conventional computers... even in virtual networks accessed through video consoles.

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The appearance of this problem on the Internet

One of the most negative aspects of addiction to social networks is that there are many people who can fall into it. The reason is that these tools do not have the bad reputation of, for example, illegal drugs, and that the fact that others use them creates more reasons to join the phenomenon. Even for professional reasons, in many sectors it is advisable to open a profile on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.

Second, as social networks have gone far beyond the computer, they can follow us everywhere from the tablet or smartphones, from which they can periodically invade our lives through vibrations and sounds. In Psychology, this can be understood as a learning process that leads to only one result: think all the time in terms of social networks, since they constantly remind us that they are there.

In the case of adolescents, their tendency to impulsivity and their need for broad and expansive social influence can cause them to quickly fall into these kinds of tendencies. Facebook, for example, offers the added value of bringing all types of social interactions together in one place: posting photos and selfies, share links and multimedia content such as songs or humorous videos with which one feels identified, publication of the existence or not of a sentimental relationship, etc.

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What kind of person falls into this obsession?

If a few years ago the stereotype of a person obsessed with new technologies was an adolescent male or young adult with a small number of friends who could not get rid of the computer, Currently, addicts to social networks present a much more heterogeneous profile to which young women and adolescents with relatively social skills have been added en masse. good.

Social networks are currently understood no longer as a limitation of relationships, but rather they have become the public "showcase" through which you have to pass almost obligatorily to be someone relevant in a community of friends and acquaintances, large or small, or to become famous for places that will never be visited.

In this way, a Facebook profile is much more than a means of maintaining contact with acquaintances: it is the ecosystem in which everything relevant in social terms will occur. Not surprisingly, for example, a concept has been created to refer to the fact that a courtship does not it starts for real until it does not appear in a Facebook status: we talk about relationships “Facebook official ".