More evidence of Net's effect on the brain

A new study provides evidence that heavy internet use by the young results in "brain structural alterations" of a kind associated with "impairment of cognitive control." The study, published this month in PLoS ONE, was conducted in China, where approximately 14 percent of urban youths - some 24 million kids - are believed to suffer from so-called "internet addiction disorder." Using brain scans, the researchers compared the brains of 18 adolescents who spend around eight to twelve hours a day online (playing games, mainly) with the brains of 18 adolescents who spend less than 2 hours a day online. The heavy Net users exhibited gray-matter "atrophy" as well as other "abnormalities," and the changes appeared to grow more severe the longer the kids engaged in intensive Net use. The whole subject of Internet addiction remains controversial among experts, but, according to a Scientific American article on the new research, the study "cuts through much of the debate and hints that excessive time online can physically rewire a brain." The Scientific American piece translates the key findings into layman's terms: One set of [MRI] images focused on gray matter at the brain's wrinkled surface, or cortex, where processing of speech, memory,...