经济学人下载:Addicted? Really?上瘾了?真的?

Sceptics say there is nothing uniquely addictive about the internet. Back in 2000 Joseph Walther, a communications professor at Michigan State University, co-wrote an article in which he suggested, tongue in cheek, that the criteria used to call someone an internet addict might also show that most professors were “addicted” to academia. He argued that other factors, such as depression, are the real problem. He stands by that view today. “No scientific evidence has emerged to suggest that internet use is a cause rather than a consequence of some other sort of issue,” he says. “Focusing on and treating people for internet addiction, rather than looking for underlying clinical issues, is unwise.”

怀疑论者认为，互联网并无让人上瘾的特性。2000年时，密西根州立大学传播学教授约瑟夫.沃尔瑟在与他人合写的一篇文章中开玩笑似地说道，如果按照所谓的网瘾标准，大部分的教授也可以叫做“学术上瘾”了。约瑟夫还表示，其他的因素，比如抑郁，才是真正需要解决的问题。约瑟夫至今还坚信该观点。“所谓使用互联网是问题的起因，而不是因其他因素造成的结果，这一点并无科学证实。”他说道，“如果只关注并着手治疗网瘾者，而不寻找其他隐藏的临床因素，是很不明智的做法。”

Others disagree. “That would be wrong,” says Kimberly Young, a researcher and therapist who has worked on internet addiction since 1994. She insists that the internet, with its powerfully immersive environments, creates new problems that people must learn to navigate.

反对的声音同样存在。从1994年便开始研究网瘾的研究者兼临床医学家金伯利.杨说道：“这种说法可能有误。”她坚持认为，互联网上强大广阔的空间，滋生出许多新问题，人们必须学习如何解决这些问题。

No one disputes that online habits can turn toxic. Take South Korea, where ubiquitous broadband means that the average high-school student plays video games for 23 hours each week. In 2007 the government estimated that around 210,000 children needed treatment for internet addiction. Last year newspapers around the globe carried the story of a South Korean couple who fed their infant daughter so little that she starved to death. Instead of caring for the child, the couple spent most nights at an internet cafe, sinking hours into a role-playing game in which they raised, fed and cared for a virtual daughter. And several South Korean men have died from exhaustion after marathon, multi-day gaming sessions.

上网有弊端已是公认事实。以韩国为例，宽带普及导致高中生平均每周花23小时玩线上游戏。2007年，韩国政府估计近21万的儿童需要接受网瘾治疗。去年，全球的报刊都报道了一对韩国夫妻因喂养不足导致女婴死亡的新闻。这对夫妻因为整夜泡在网吧里，沉浸在一个线上喂养和照顾女儿的虚拟游戏中，根本没有时间照顾真正的女儿。另有几名韩国男性因长时间沉浸于线上游戏劳累过度而死。

The South Korean government has since asked game developers to adopt a gaming curfew for children, to prevent them playing between midnight and 8am. It has also opened more than 100 clinics for internet addiction and sponsored an “internet rescue camp” for serious cases.

此后，韩国政府要求游戏开发商采取电玩宵禁，禁止儿童在半夜到早晨8点之间玩游戏。同时，政府还增开了100家网瘾治疗诊所，并资助针对严重案例展开的“网瘾拯救营”活动。

But compulsive behaviour is not limited to gamers. E-mail or web-use behaviours can also show signs of addiction. Getting through a business lunch in which no one pulls out a phone to check their messages now counts as a minor miracle in many quarters. A deluge of self-help books, most recently “Alone Together” by Sherry Turkle, a social scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, offer advice on how to unplug.

但强迫性行为并不仅仅是玩游戏。电子邮件和其他网络行为也可能导致上瘾。很多时候，如果一个商业午餐中没有一个人拿出手机查邮件的话，就已经是个小奇迹了。现在有许多自救书目，包括最近MIT社会学家谢里.特尔可的《一起孤独》，提供了如何摆脱上述强迫性行为的方法。