Posted on 06/17/2012 9:42:41 AM PDT by thecodont
IN what way do you spend your time online? Do you check your e-mail compulsively? Watch lots of videos? Switch frequently among multiple Internet applications — from games to file downloads to chat rooms? Enlarge This Image
Brian Cronin We believe that your pattern of Internet use says something about you. Specifically, our research suggests it can offer clues to your mental well-being.
In a study to be published in a forthcoming issue of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, we and our colleagues found that students who showed signs of depression tended to use the Internet differently from those who showed no symptoms of depression.
In February of last year, we recruited 216 undergraduate volunteers at Missouri University of Science and Technology. First, we had the participants fill out a version of a questionnaire called the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale, which is widely used for measuring depression levels in the general population. The survey revealed that 30 percent of the participants met the criteria for depressive symptoms. (This was in line with national estimates that 10 to 40 percent of college students at some point experience such symptoms.)
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I don’t think we need this.
“What are the practical applications of this research? We hope to use our findings to develop a software application that could be installed on home computers and mobile devices. It would monitor your Internet usage and alert you when your usage patterns might signal symptoms of depression. This would not replace the function of mental health professionals, but it could be a cost-effective way to prompt people to seek medical help early. It might also be a tool for parents to monitor the mood-related Internet usage patterns of their children.
Such software could also be used at universities, perhaps installed on campus networks to notify counselors of students whose Internet usage patterns are indicative of depressive behavior. (This proposal, of course, raises privacy concerns that would have to be addressed.) “
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't a good reason to be.
Together with Obamacare, go to the “wrong” list of sites or in the wrong order and your compulsory prescription will soon be ready.
Depressives never spend the weekend compulsively reading the Sunday Times.
>>We hope to use our findings to develop a software application that could be installed on home computers and mobile devices. It would monitor your Internet usage and alert you when your usage patterns might signal symptoms of depression.<<
Sort of like your medicine cabinet in THX 1138...
But it might be in their browser history shortly before the symptoms started showing up.
It’s heavy on the correlations of activity, but very light on the causation side of things. It says depressives switch between email and video games a lot. Lots of non-depressive people do that too. Lots of people who have short attention spans are perfectly happy.
IOW, a practically useless study. Did we pay for it?
Yeah, you like that idea?
I can see the linkage they suggest but....
I’m on the Internet ‘cause I tend to get bored.
What could possibly go wrong?
(It's encouraging to see how many FReepers picked up on this point)
I agree with the theory that self pity is at the root of depression, and that would mean people who frequent liberal websites are clinically depressed, whatever that means. They should be put in straight jackets before they hurt themselves or someone else, or before they can use their votes to hurt us.
I’m on the internet because the household TV is monopolized by baseball games of which I tire quickly - esp. when the team you’re watching and rooting for is in last place.
Go to an unapproved site, such as FR, and "warning flags" alert the authorities, who send the jack boots to confiscate your guns "for your protection". Disagreement and protest will only confirm your "depression" and require detainment or if "severe enough", immediate termination.
I already know I’m depressed. I suspect most ‘depressives’ do.
It means you are sad for a reason not apparent to the diagnostician who lacks a particle of empathy, and who has been taught that you are just an elaborate biological machine anyhow.
>>Yeah, you like that idea?
I can see the linkage they suggest but....<<
It is a warning — and a prediction.
>>It means you are sad for a reason not apparent to the diagnostician who lacks a particle of empathy, and who has been taught that you are just an elaborate biological machine anyhow. <<
Although I think it is over-diagnosed, are you suggesting that depression is NOT a medical condition? That, if you try hard enough, a person can just undo it?
What do we have here?...online psychiatrist....using Sigmund Frued on the people who uses the computer...what the hell is it made for any way? More defecating democrat BS.
I did not mean to “suggest” anything at all. If you find my comment obscure, I hope someone else won’t! :)
Dear Mr. Smith (ID# S187652432BAE),
There has been a recent change in your internet habits indicating that you may be suffering from depression. Your Mental Health Predictive Risk Indicator (MHPRI) has increased from a value of .55 to .83, which is indicative of depressive, aggressive or self-destructive tendencies. Please contact your local National Health Care Coordination Office (NHCCO) to arrange a visit with a mental health care professional. Please refer to Case# M982278222C.
Two months later, you decide it is time to get your conceal carry permit renewed. The application is denied with the message:
Dear Mr. Smith (ID# S187652432BAE),
Your request for a conceal carry permit has been denied. You have been flagged with a MHPRI that exceeds the guidelines for a conceal carry permit. There is an outstanding appointment requirement that must be fulfilled before your application can be processed. Refer to Case# M982278222C. Since you have not acted on this suggestion from the National Health Care Office (NHCO) after you fulfill that suggestion for counseling, you will then need set up an appointment to review your application in person with a National Firearms Registry tribunal board.
Then one day you get called into your boss's office, and he says:
"Winston, the National Work Fitness Office (NWFO) has send us a notification that, due to increasing incidents of road rage, all companies using nationally registered drivers must temporarily suspend without pay (pending an NHCO evaluation) drivers who have outstanding NHCO appointment suggestions with a category 2 flag. What? Er, I don't know what a category two flag means. Let me look it up. Hmm. That is a suggestion you seek mental health counseling. Really? Why didn't you notify us as regulations instruct you to when you got the initial request you contact the NHCCO so set up an appointment? This is serious. Look, other employees have put in anonymous cases on you for speaking against our diversity program and our plans for "Gay Love Week". This shows me you cannot be trusted...for all I know, you could be a hate-speech filled ticking time bomb, just waiting to bring an assault rifle into work to kill us. We are going to have to let you go..."
I got what you meant, :-).
Hahahaha...especially if you read blam's posts!
(Heh, only kidding, blam...:)
>>I did not mean to “suggest” anything at all<<
So you STATE depression is not a medical condition/ That, if you try hard enough, a person can just undo it.
And your MD is in what, exactly?
I’ve NEVER had a problem admitting when I have a problem. It all just depends on whether I want to do anything about it or not...
Of course, the internet gets boring because I reached the end of it several months ago...it’s all just a repeat to me now.
You’re a bit hostile, aren’t you? Kindly do not rephrase and misrepresent my comment. I shall not respond to you further.
Well done, Sir.
The depressed visited more sites on how to commit suicide. Thanks, feds, for the money handout. Now, onto our next study which shows a difference between sites males and females spend most of their time visiting, again, all paid by you, the taxpayer...
Ha! No thanks.
Not my ream per se but this is what happens. After they loose I have pre made partials of thrown away barbies, GI Joes and other dolls then they're dressed in pin stripes, Boston red/gray , Dodger blue. I set them op on a log( sometimes it's a baseball card of a pic on a stick of some idiot I do NOT like far down the way so as not to harm anyone and fire away with my nice Remington 700, or maybe full auto on the Mattel, the AR-15 or the MP-5 and for up close and personal the special loads for my sig sauer P-226 then a finishing touch with the Walther P-22. If i still cannot hit anything well, the Ithica( I had a 36, you know the duck bulled contraption that blows whole front of houses away!).
If I'm still angry and not laughing at the sheer fun of blowing hell out of dolls, the fun and idiocy of it I take out the samurai sword, make weird noises like John Belushi and hack away.
Of course if there's a pheasant,dove, the neighbors pigeons, a deer or a real live duckie, a squirrel or a rabbit, well they take precedence. I am depressed no longer. Go back to watching baseball and have fun cleaning, and reloading all over again...then I go to church Bible studies...muahahahahahahaa. Eat that you &*&^&* shrinks!*retired shrinker aka nurse scratchit
You apparently weren't paying attention for the almost ten years that I posted only anthropology/archaeology articles.
Myself, Sabretooth and Ernest_at_The_Beach started the GGG (Gods, Graves and Glyphs) group/feature at Free Republic. SunkenCiv is doing a wonderful job of managing it now.
I don't ping anyone to my posts so you found your own way there.
What does that mean?
Social scientists and “counselors” of almost every stripe are suuuuuuch whiney, opportunistic, controlling attention whores:
They get out their flashy ho clothes after a mass-shooting, so eager to show how indispensable they are.
Some are sincere, but many are would-be cops who hated guns, would-be auditors who had no knack for math.
HERE they go again...
Don’t take it personally, please, blam...I seriously was joking.
I do find my way to your threads you start on my own, they are often threads about the coming collapse of society and such.
I do apologize. Didn’t mean to offend you. Just trying to find some humor anywhere in these admittedly dark times.
Heh, thanks...kind of has the ring of authenticity to it, doesn’t it?
>> Kindly do not rephrase and misrepresent my comment. <<
Your original comment clearly implied my conclusion. It was not complete on its face.
If you did not mean what I said I invite you to clarify. Or leave everyone to conclude as they wish, up to and including my interpretation.
It isn’t hostility — it is clarity.
uh... what's a TV ?
Depression is real, and a result of (pick one) [childhood environment/alcohol-abuse/drug-abuse/poor self-esteem/the choices you have made in life].
When I started 'doubting' medical opinion is when they came up with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).
>>Depression is real, and a result of (pick one) [childhood environment/alcohol-abuse/drug-abuse/poor self-esteem/the choices you have made in life].<<
None of the above. It is a result of complex chemical interactions/imbalances in the brain. Real depression can be treated with drugs specifically to correct these imbalances. This has been proven innumerable times with complete success.
The others are versions of sadness.
For those who would like a shortcut. This will explain everything.
Sounded to me like he was just 'pulling your leg'.
Imagine all those mulling throngs of people who go around thinking they are happy, just because they don't know they are depressed. Oh... the humanity.
That's like explaining obesity by stating that the stomach has acids that digest what we ingest.
The 'issue' is 'what' causes these complex interactions and/or imbalances.
You're right, if this keeps just one person from feeling happy when they really aren't, it's worth it!
Hahahahaha...THAT was funny! Thanks for posting it!
Don't let this secret out, but depression is a physical condition, and is what generates the mental condition.
We treat it medically (medicinally), but, like most of our MEDICAL problems, we treat the symptoms, and not the cause.
Yes, there are some whose brains aren't wired right, and in their case, medicines are sometimes the only relief.
I suspect that some who are 'clinically' depressed, are not, and some who are not diagnosed that way, are.
I'm not sure we (current medicinal/psychiatric practice in the US) are that good at diagnosing that precisely.
I agre. We have enough “Nannystateism !”
I used to suffer from severe depression. Thoughts of suicide, tried it once (seriously) as a teenager.
Now? Sometimes for a day or an hour, or even a couple of weeks at the most, (but nothing as severe as before) but I know what to do about it.
The “drug solution” is not the real cure; some psychoactive drugs may help a person for a short while - none are meant to be lifelong anyway - until the person can figure out what is wrong with their life choices, or begins to realize that emotions can be controlled, tamed and ultimately changed. The mind does not have to be one’s master.
And some people are by nature more dour and some more jolly. It’s the way the world is. Just like some people have a gimpy leg and some don’t. Some have more prone to anger, or lust, or greed, or are more critical of others, more impatient, more feelings of hopeless, or cheer, rosy colored glasses, etc.
Life is meant for education - to learn lessons, and popping pills to numb what we are experiencing is not the solution.
The person is not the brain, the brain changes with use and what we focus on; the brain is not the engine. The soul is the engine.
Yeah, I was wondering if we should start up a foundation to find a cure.
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