Excessive Internet use can alter the brain’s reward system, just as it alters decision-making or attention span, among other faculties, according to a study of telephone addiction among adolescents.
Young people who cannot stop using their cell phones experience visible changes in their brain chemistry, which facilitate the formation of addictive behaviors and affect the mental health, development, intellectual capacity and physical coordination of adolescents between 10 and 19 years.
This is indicated by a new study published in the American scientific journal PLOS Mental Health, which analyzes 12 previous studies with a sample of 237 people in total and carried out between 2013 and 2023, and takes into account functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI) taken of the participants’ brains.
The researchers found that, during phone use, a general decrease in the connections of the parts of the brain involved in active thinking could be noticed, that is, fewer connections involved in the brain network responsible for memory and decision making. .
As the abstract of the study indicates: «Internet use has experienced a marked global increase in recent decades, particularly among adolescents and young people, who have also increasingly been diagnosed with Internet addiction. Internet addiction affects several neural networks that influence the behavior and development of an adolescent.”
The results warn of the negative and lasting effects that could form in the adolescent’s mind, and that would be more difficult to eradicate later, although it could be done with appropriate therapy. Ultimately, this addiction in the crucial years of adolescence can affect the ability to maintain relationships and participate in social activities, as well as cause irregular eating patterns and sleep disorders.
With all this, the study confirms a suspicion that has been warned about for years: compulsive cell phone use can worsen people’s performance in activities that require introspection and attention.
They call for containment in daily use
The authors of the study emphasize the importance of young people being aware of the repercussions of spending too much time online. They highlight the use of screen time limitations to control daily mobile phone use, and also the importance of parents educating their children properly in this regard.
Adolescence is a hot spot in which the brain is particularly vulnerable to the patterns that result from compulsive Internet use, more so than during adulthood. The researchers hope that this work can contribute to the future development of therapies for technology addiction.
However, there are critical voices regarding this and other studies of the same nature. In this case, Professor David Ellis from the University of Bath, in the United Kingdom, calls for caution when considering the results valid. According to him, the measurement of Internet addiction is not universally accepted among the scientific community, and it is not possible to analyze it with the instruments used in the previous studies that are part of the work discussed here, according to the Daily Mail.
