Internet-use related addiction: The state of the art of clinical research

Abstract

Introduction

In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association included Internet Gaming Disorder in the appendix of the 5th edition of the DSM-5, suggesting more research is necessary for the condition to be officially accepted as mental disorder. Criticisms have emerged as to the viability, validity and reliability of the proposed condition, and researchers have pointed out that the subsuming of Internet addiction under the umbrella term of Internet Gaming Disorder (as is the case in the DSM-5) is highly problematic.

Objectives and aims

The objective of this talk is to provide a comprehensive and inclusive analysis of clinical research of Internet-use related addictions from a holistic perspective, given the ambiguity of previous research in the field.

Methods

A systematic literature review was conducted using the database Web of Science, and a total of 44 empirical and clinically relevant studies were identified.

Results

Results indicated that the published clinical research studies can be categorized into four areas, including (i) treatment seeker characteristics, (ii) psychopharmacotherapy, (iii), psychological therapy, and (iv) combined treatment, each of which will be discussed.

Conclusions

At the present day, both diagnosis and research of Internet-use disorders appears rather broad. Furthermore, there appears a need for developing a gold standard of clinical assessment. This will support the establishment of efficacious and effective treatments which need to be tailored to the individual help seekers’ needs.

Disclosure of interest

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.