Abstract
Coined in the 1990s, the term "Internet addiction" encapsulates a brief but influential human history of technological advancement and psychological development. However, most studies have treated Internet addiction as a "global" concept in the realm of science without taking into consideration its sociocultural meanings and local history. In China, obsessive online gaming behavior among youth is viewed as a national issue of public health and social control. This article examines the special development of interventions to address Internet addiction in China within a broader local history of culturally inflected social control, market reform, the one-child policy, and psychology. Based on historical review and ethnographic data from a treatment center specializing in Internet addiction, this article presents a deep analysis of what Internet addiction means in Chinese lives. It argues that Internet addiction is, in fact, a cultural idiom of distress related to social control rather than a universal syndrome of self-control. It represents the dynamic interactions between Confucian family values and market reform, the one-child policy, and recent trends in psychology and technology.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 328-350 |
Number of pages | 23 |
Journal | History of Psychology |
Volume | 22 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Nov 2019 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Chinese psychology
- Internet addiction
- Cultural idiom of distress
- Family-based intervention
- Social control