Asyik Main Internet Berlebihan: Waspada Terkena Adiksi Internet

Merdeka.com, Bandung – Have you ever felt panicked when you left your smartphone at home while traveling? Or are you one of those people who can't live without it and constantly checks it? Be careful, you could be developing an internet addiction or dependency.

Dimitri Mahayana, a lecturer at the ITB School of Electrical Engineering and Informatics and a Data Scientist at Sharing Vision, stated that the growing number of Android users has had negative impacts. One of these is the emergence of internet dependency or addiction.

"Internet addiction is characterized by excessive or uncontrolled preoccupation, urges, or behaviors related to computer use and internet access that cause disturbance or distress," Dimitri told Merdeka Bandung when met at Kapulaga Indonesian Bistro recently.

An Internet Addiction Test (IAT) was administered to 514 respondents in Indonesia. The IAT consisted of 20 questions that measured people's level of internet dependence, such as, "How often do you fear that life without the internet would be boring, meaningless, and unpleasant?"

"The test results showed that 55.34 percent of respondents scored between 31 and 49, meaning they experienced mild internet dependency or addiction," he explained.

Meanwhile, he continued, 11.9 percent of respondents had experienced moderate internet dependence or addiction, 0.4 percent of respondents had experienced severe internet dependence or addiction with scores between 80 and 100 percent.

"This should be a matter of concern. Furthermore, we found a correlation between the level of internet addiction or dependence and the age of the respondents. The younger the respondent, the higher the tendency for internet addiction," he said.

Meanwhile, the number of mobile, smartphone, and internet users in Indonesia is expected to continue to increase. The number of mobile users is predicted to increase to 265.3 million in 2019, with a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 4.77 percent.

Smartphone users are expected to increase to 140.4 million in 2019 (a CAGR of 26.17 percent). Internet users are also expected to increase to 178.4 million in 2019 (a CAGR of 12.8 percent). Similarly, mobile internet users are predicted to reach 89.4 million in 2019, with a CAGR of 9.23 percent.

Despite this growth, the Indonesian smartphone market is still dominated by Android. Android now controls over 90 percent of the Indonesian smartphone market and 75 percent globally. In fact, of the approximately five million applications currently running on smartphones, 40 percent are Android-based.