Internet abuse and internet addiction in the workplace

Purpose – This paper seeks to overview the issues, concerns and challenges relating to internet abuse and internet addiction in the workplace.Design/methodology/approach – Using psychological literature, the paper outlines a number of important and inter‐related areas including brief overviews of internet abuse, and the most extreme form of internet abuse in the workplace (i.e. internet addiction).Findings – The paper reveals that internet abuse is a relatively neglected area of research and that internet abuse is a potentially serious cause of concern for employers. It also highlights that there are many different kinds of internet abuse in the workplace (e.g. cybersexual internet abuse, and online friendship/relationship abuse, internet activity abuse, online information abuse, criminal internet abuse). It is concluded that internet abuse has the potential to be a serious occupational issue.Research limitations/implications – The empirical base for the paper was based on a relatively small number of pee...

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