Since the World Health Organization and the NHS do not yet recognize digital addictions, where do you turn when your life is consumed by scrolling? Three participants in a 12-step program for internet addicts have heard from the BBC. “It was better than going outside, it was better than speaking to Mum and Dad, it was better than drawing.” In a tiny space at the West Oxford Community Center, Sophia, 19, talks about her ten-year, disastrous connection with technology. Sophia was brought to the UK at a young age by her parents after being raised in a slum in East Asia. She claimed that her electronics seemed like pals during her lonely early years in Oxfordshire.
She remarked, “I was alone and shunned, and I hadn’t mastered English that well yet. It was this ideal object that might have been anything I needed at the moment, including solace in case I was feeling alone.” Sophia, 15, claimed to have stopped using social media, but her compulsive behaviors persisted. She claimed that, driven by ambitions to lift her family out of poverty, she started binge-watching self-help videos for 16 hours every day, totaling over 10,000 views, with the goal of achieving financial success and personal development. “My personal life was in disarray. I was suicidal, I had terrible grades, and I hardly remember my adolescent years,” she remarked.
Sophia went to Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous (ITAA), a 12-step rehabilitation organization modeled after Alcoholics Anonymous, for assistance in 2023. Founded in 2017, ITAA describes itself as a “self-supporting community of individuals” where members from all around the world provide support to one another via online, in-person, and one-on-one sponsorships. It addresses social media, video streaming, online news, dating sites, pornography, gaming, and online research addictions. In the UK, there are currently just two in-person support groups: Oxford and London. A third is scheduled to launch in Manchester shortly.
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