Over the past year I have been conducting statistical analysis on many different items that are related to the health of youth. One area of interest to me has been whether excessive internet use might be associated with the mental health of young people.

I obtained a database from the Youth Risk Behavior Survey of Idaho, 2009. In that questionnaire there were several different items that interested me such as how much high school students use the internet for three hours or more on school days for activities other than school use. We found that when students use the internet in such excessive amounts they are 1.5 times more likely to feel sad or hopeless, 1.6 times more likely to consider suicide, 1.8 times more likely to attempt suicide, twice as likely to purposefully hurt themselves by cutting or otherwise injuring themselves, and half as likely to talk to a parent or teacher when they are feeling low or having problem.

This post is the first in a series on social media. The content comes directly from a land-mark article in the journal Pediatrics, a publication of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Engaging in various forms of social media is a routine activity that research has shown to benefit children and adolescents by enhancing communication, social connection, and even technical skills. Social media sites such as Facebook and MySpace offer multiple daily opportunities for connecting with friends, classmates, and people with shared interests. During the last 5 years, the number of preadolescents and adolescents using such sites has increased dramatically.

Teens typically use the internet for education and for amusement. While many teens are normal internet users, for others the internet captures the focus of their mind in an abnormal way. They may not know it, but obsessive internet use can become an addiction. 

Internet addiction can be measured using Young's Internet Addiction Scale.

Lots of people use the Internet in the USA. About 74% of Americans over 18 are online, and most people (60%) access the Internet with high-speed broadband connections. Up to 80% of people use the web to search for health information, among their other online activities.

Concern is spreading over children's excessive media use such as Internet, violent video games, and online gambling and pornography. Today's young people grow up in a media-saturated culture.

Ask any 10 or 12 year old about this issue and they will probably not understand why anyone would consider it a problem. After all, today’s kids don’t know any life without an abundance of electronic devices. Electronic stimuli are simply part of the world they were born into.

While there is much concern about the potential damage of all this, there has not been sufficient research in the past. But new vast quantities of research are emerging. We are now learning the risks (and the occasional benefits) of what is going on.