PSYCHOLOGY OF CYBERSPACE FORUM ARCHIVE
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Re: Internet Intoxication
Anitah · 2/6/00 at 9:17 pm ET
Forgive me for not emphasizing how truly impressive My personal area of exploration has been on IRC. IRC You asked about the 24/7 level of involvement. This means I have done an expose of one of the conflicts lasting a The more different kinds of online experience and communities we can observe the more we can glean greater I see the Internet as a mirror which can help us understand
your online book "Psychology Of Cyberspace" is, and how
happy I am to have come across it. Your site
represents an extraordinary breakthrough in helping
mental health professional come together in one place
and brain storm their ideas. Both you, with your involvement in "The Palace" community, and Professor Sheri Turkle with hers in MUDs, certainly pave the way for others to follow.
(Internet Relay Chat) throws another element into the mix:
A thing called "Ops," which is the name given for a technical tool, meaning simply "operator status."
However, it is also a weapon and used as such. This
turns the whole community experience into a kind of war
game. As conflict is the engine that drives drama, and
also reveals the character of each individual who is engaged
it covers a whole other area of exploration into the human
psyche and how it affects social dynamics.
that people are literally logged on 24 hours a day. They
may step away, or they may go in and out periodically
during work hours, but their involvement is intense, mainly because they are basically always at war and leaving the battle field can cost you the war. The "pawns" in the game, those who are there mainly to socially interract and chat are hooked in by emotional connections, and may or may not be equally as engaged as others, depending of course on the individual and their level of awareness about what the game is all about.
period of six months on my web site at http://www.channelvip.com/philosophy/collage.html. for anyone who wants to take a closer look. I would very
much like to hear whatever insights health professionals
might be able to offer from their perspective.
insights into not only the question of how human beings are reacting and transforming through this technology but also what it may reveal about the real world society at large. For instance, there is much talk about Internet addiction. The word addiction may not accurately reflect the true dynamics at play here. I think what appears as addiction,
may be the result of a larger problem in the society,
and this is where the focus ought to be, for it points
to the true nature of isolation and alienation people
are experiencing in the real world. This may help us
understand not only how to create better online
communities but also help us improve our real world
environments as well. Quite frankly, I think it might be useless to treat the problem purely as addiction when the real bedrock cause lies somewhere else. This may also be
true for the propensity to prescribe antidepressants as
a bane for other serious causes that are being overlooked
and remain psychologically unresolved.
ourselves and our world in new and challenging ways, and
I don't think we should step back from these challenges
and resort to old, tired techniques, but we must explore
new ways of seeing and living, both online and off.
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