Is Your Child a Facebook Addict?

Have you ever asked yourself if your son or daughter spends too much time on Facebook? In a very interesting article for the New York Times, Katie Hafner explores the problem of Facebook obsession, and how many teens find it difficult to disconnect from the site, even though it’s a huge distraction from their other responsibilities.

From the article:

Facebook, the popular networking site, has 350 million members worldwide who, collectively, spend 10 billion minutes there every day, checking in with friends, writing on people’s electronic walls, clicking through photos and generally keeping pace with the drift of their social world.

Make that 9.9 billion and change. Recently, Halley Lamberson, 17, and Monica Reed, 16, juniors at San Francisco University High School, made a pact to help each other resist the lure of the login. Their status might as well now read, “I can’t be bothered.”

“We decided we spent way too much time obsessing over Facebook and it would be better if we took a break from it,” Halley said.

By mutual agreement, the two friends now allow themselves to log on to Facebook on the first Saturday of every month — and only on that day.

[...]

Facebook will not reveal how many users have deactivated service, but Kimberly Young, a psychologist who is the director of the Center for Internet Addiction Recovery in Bradford, Pa., said she had spoken with dozens of teenagers trying to break the Facebook habit.

“It’s like any other addiction,” Dr. Young said. “It’s hard to wean yourself.”

Dr. Young said she admired teenagers who came up with their own strategies for taking Facebook breaks in the absence of computer-addiction programs aimed at them.

“A lot of them are finding their own balance,” she said. “It’s like an eating disorder. You can’t eliminate food. You just have to make better choices about what you eat.” She added, “And what you do online.”

The article goes on to explore how Facebook may be getting in the way of important tasks like applying for college.

Many high school seniors, now in the thick of the college application process, are acutely aware of those hours spent clicking one link after another on the site.

Gaby Lee, 17, a senior at Head-Royce School in Oakland, Calif., had two weeks to complete her early decision application to Pomona College. Desperate, she deactivated her Facebook account.

The account still existed, but it looked to others as if it did not.

“No one could go on and write on my wall or look at my profile,” she said.

The habit did not die easily. Gaby said she would sit down at the computer and find that “my fingers would automatically go to Facebook.”

In her coming book, “Alone Together” (Basic Books, 2010), Sherry Turkle, a psychologist who is director of the Initiative on Technology and Self at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, discusses teenagers who take breaks from Facebook.

For one 18-year-old boy completing a college application, Professor Turkle said, “Facebook wasn’t merely a distraction, but it was really confusing him about who he was,” and he opted to spend his senior year off the service. He was burned out, she said, trying to live up to his own descriptions of himself.

I’ll be the first to admit that I spend a lot of time online. Partly, it’s a function of my job. If I weren’t spending my day putting together comprehensive Facebook privacy guides or reporting on late-breaking privacy news, I might not have much use for the web. However, I also recognize that I like going online. I love how I can connect with friends and peers through social networking websites like Facebook and Twitter. I love how I can easily and effectively promote my professional identity through my blog. Most of all, however, I love the access that the web gives me to a world’s worth of information.

That being said, I know when to call it quits. If I have somewhere to go or someone to meet, I don’t have a problem turning off the monitor and walking away from the computer. For some web surfers, it’s not that easy. If you believe your son or daughter is spending too much time online, talk to them about their web habits. If you think Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace is getting in the way of your child’s school work or inhibiting their social life, help them prioritize their responsibilities. Psychologists believe that teens will continue to mature emotionally and psychologically into their early twenties. If you don’t lay down some ground rules when they’re first beginning to use these technologies, you may find it difficult to help them later in life.

In a companion piece to Hafner’s article, Katherine Schulten prompts teens to ask themselves “Do I Spend Too Much Time on Facebook?” Check it out to see what some teens are saying about their internet habits.