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Radio 1 Stories: Meet the Net Addicts

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04/11/2014

Meet the Net Addicts

BBC Radio 1 - Radio 1 Stories, Meet the Net Addicts

Radio 1 meets young net addicts - people with online habits that have become a problem.

Aled Haydn Jones meets young net addicts - people whose online habits have become such big problems that they have had to seek help.

As increasing numbers of people admit to problems with compulsive online porn viewing, visiting adult chat rooms, gaming, or spending excessive time on social networks, Aled Haydn Jones examines how the information technology that we all take for granted is becoming a problem for some. 

Children as young as 11 are being treated for addiction to computer games; and, in some cases, their parents have been threatened with violence when they tried to take devices away from them.

In this programme Aled meets several young people for whom being online has turned negative - among them 20 year old David from Belfast, whose gaming habits went out of control. 'I'd play for 16 hours every single day, I would get up, switch my lap top on, immediately start playing until it was time to sleep. I wouldn't even get up to get food, I'd get my parents to bring the meals out to me because I just didn't want to get out of the zone.'

David says one game really took over his life. 'I had to win. It was life or death. Whenever I did lose I'd lose my cool. I'd shout at people and I smashed so much stuff just through playing online games.'

Linda's 21 year old son Connor, from London, developed a gaming addiction over three years after suffering from clinical depression. He would spend 13 or 14 hours online constantly and Linda says it had a physical impact on her son. 'He would eat a diet of coca cola and pizza and take it all up to his room. He put on about three stone.'

But gaming isn't the only online activity which can take over your life. 19 year old Danny from Alnwick developed an addiction to posting selfies of himself on Facebook and other social media.  He says: 'I was posting 200 selfies a day, it was completely out of control and technology enabled that.'

Aled hears from experts about how widespread the problem is and how online habits are often related to other issues in peoples' lives. He also hears about a centre in America dedicated to helping people with their online addictions.

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