Partaking in chat rooms allows a person to meet people and expand his/her social network in a medium that is not bound by time and location constraints. However, too much time spent in chat rooms point to signs of PIU, Problematic Internet Use. It can become a space that people excessively use, neglecting important obligations to schoolwork, family and friends in order to stay in the chat room. Additionally, it can reach a point where the person compulsively obsesses over their next interactions in the space and loses his/her ability to control the amount of time spent in the chat room.
When Googling “addiction to online chatting”, I came across a thread from http://soberrecovery.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-618.html, which is a blog for recovering alcoholics. Interestingly, they had a section for recovering addicts that conquered their substance abuse only to succumb to an addiction to online chat rooms.
I obviously wouldn’t generalize these recovering addict’s experiences as typical usage of chat rooms as these people are self-professed addicts and understand that they have addictive tendencies. However, they do provide an interesting lens in to view Caplan’s theory which basically states that people with psychosocial problems have very negative views about their social competence so they prefer Internet interaction as which it turns worsens their initial problems. One blogger’s comment in particular alluded to this cyclical occurence as she wrote, “I've kind of withdrawn, become a little awkward and shy. Maybe it could be combined factors in my life that have caused me to be the way I am now, but I believe most the reason could be being addicted to online or chatting… I would go to the community site and feel comfortable there”.
Many of the bloggers admitted to escaping into these chat rooms for ridiculously long periods of time in order to distract themselves from their difficult recovery period, which corresponds the distraction factor of Davis, Flett and Besser’s study. The affordances of the Internet allow these addicts to escape their “real selves” due to the ability to employ greater control over their self-presentation. On the other hand, if they want to really be themselves, the Internet provides an environment conducive to more intense and intimate self-disclosures. This addiction could just be an outcome of Wallace calls “Newbie disease” as chat rooms are novel to them and provide the same rush that drinking did.
However, the impetus behind the person’s addiction to chat rooms is clearly the same psychosocial problem that led to the alcohol abuse. Compulsively chatting might be the only way to combat their loneliness or need for social comfort, as they might not be ready to do it in person quite yet. This blog is a perfect example of how important an individual’s disposition is in context of Internet addiction as people with addictive personalities will utilize whatever CMC space they’re in and its affordances and will subsequently get addicted.
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This is a very interesting point in that people who have "addictive personalities" will be more likely to become addicted to the internet. Your post made me think about counseling on the internet and what the implications of that would be. Would internet psychologists become more addicting for people and make them more dependent than a psychologist that one sees face to face, due to the affordances of the internet? I wonder how group counseling with a moderator would pan out on the internet and if this would be a helpful tool or not. I think that if the counseling, whether group or individual, was limited to solely one hour, twice a week as it would be in a face to face setting, this may prevent the addictive consequences that is associated with the constant accessibility of the internet
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