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MAIDS and Internet Addiction Disorder

MAIDS and IAD

Social and Computer Diseases

Several months ago I cam across an evening standard article which declared the discovery of a new Social and Behavioural disease called MAIDS (mail and internet deficiency Syndrome) caused by the breakdown of technology and computers and phones that don't work.

I was interested today to see a twitter update that also highlights these dangers and suggests that the young are particularly susceptible.

How do you tell if you have MAIDS or IAD, It starts with the withdrawal of your means to communications (email and internet are down at home or in the office) - you get anxious says the report and you start to sweat, you get irritable and grumpy and you don't recover until full service is restored.

At the computer help people we can identify with this issue with some of the calls we get on our helpdesk.

Children and Computers

According to the most recent article children are more susceptible to this than Adults and it is forming a cornerstone of research at Kaohslung Medical University Hospital in Taiwan. According to this research children who spend a lot of time in front of the computer can tend to have behavioural problems.

I am the father of 5 Daughters (hence you have to be nice to me) and I am always concerned that the use of technology does not inhibit their social abilities. I banned the TV many years ago and I restrict their use of the computer to a controlled minimum. I also ensure that they do not have internet access for significant periods of time so that they are forced to socialise in person with their friends.

I believe that the restriction of access to these media, helps my children to grow into socially responsible people who understand the word conversation. One of the things that often sets them apart is their ability to talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk right from an early age. Those of you who have met me will understand that this may well be genetic.

I got this quote from CNN

“But if at-risk children–such as those identified in the Taiwanese study–are given sufficient time and exposure without careful monitoring, Internet addiction could easily become one of the most chronic childhood diseases in America, says Dr. Dimitri A. Christakis of the Center for Child Health, Behavior, and Development, in Seattle.

Our culture practically mandates time online, he says, with Wi-Fi connections in coffee shops and BlackBerries and iPhones that allow Internet access almost anywhere. “It would be as if we mandated that everyone drink two beers every day or everyone gamble for an hour every day,” says Christakis.”

Getting a Balance

One of the things that worries me is how easy it is to get misinformation from the internet, I could show you many examples of this - just think that anyone (yes anyone) can publish a profesional looking and thoroughly believable websites that contain absolute tripe. Consider the areas of alternative medicine where you have claims for everything from a cure for cancer to eternal youth!

Our responsibilities as parents means we ought to carefully monitor what our children are looking at and when! How do we do that in an age of laptops and online school-work!

One of my clients has a great solution - he has a purpose built computer unit in his kitchen with the families computers all cabled in. They have access to the internet and to t a good printer - the whole family's itunes and photos and they use it all together. This client has gone one further - as they are all on a windows server - they all share a profile which means that anyone can log into any machine at any time and they will see the history of the previous user.

One other thing though helps. We installed for this client a firewall that includes very strtict content filtering which was set up liberally but safely to restrict access to certain classes of site. This content filtering is done best at the gateway as it reduces the overhead on the PC and allows for users to use any device to browse with.

Lastly, we installed for one client a system where the children got access to the computer whenever they wanted but restricted internet access to just a few named sites (schoolsite and trusted research sites) if they wanted to exceed these boundaries then they had to ask. This method was very effective in allowing the children opportunity to work on the computer without hinderance.

Summary

Getting the balance right is very hard and I have dealt with enough sensitive cases over the years to realise the hearbreak there is when things go wrong. I always suggest to parents including parental filters at home for your child's protection. But these are not the only methods available.

One thing to do in addition to setting the restrictions in place is to talk to your children about why. I have had this discussion several times with my teenagers and it does work - though it can be awkward with questions like "don't you trust us" (now there's a question begging for an answer). I always answer that one "Princess - of course I trust you, but I don't trust anyone else!"

Also restrict the time youngsters spend on the internet and encourage activities that bring them into contact with their friends but without the technology. I have found that visitors to my house at first look for the telly, they then sort of look lost and then within about 5 minutes are hooning around the house yelling and screaming and laughing playing games with their host and her sisters.

Give the kids a chance. Reduce Restrict Remove!

If you need more information on this subject give me a call on 0845 260 9800 or 07932 360 761

Sharif George

Posted: 06/10/2009

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