Internet Addiction and Delay Discounting in College Students

To examine the relation between Internet addiction and delay discounting, we gave 276 college students a survey designed to measure Internet addiction and a paper-based delay-discounting task. In edour larger sample, we identified 14 students who met the criteria for Internet addiction; we also identified 14 matched controls who were similar to the Internet-addicted students in terms of gender, age, and grade point average. We then compared the extent to which these groups discounted delayed rewards. We found that Internet addicts discounted delayed rewards faster than non-Internet addicts. These results suggest that Internet addicts may be more impulsive than non-Internet addicts and that Internet addiction may share behavioral characteristics with other types of addiction.

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