Are we becoming Internet addicts?

One product of our growing engagement with the mobile internet is what psychologists have labelled Constant Partial Attention.

As the name suggests, this is a condition in which people lose the ability to follow a line of argument for any length of time. They lose focus because they're addicted to digital multi-tasking and flitting from one screen or internet page to another.

A 2009 Ontario study suggested that young adults were less well equipped to enter university than they had been just a handful of years before, simply because they were not as good at following auditory lectures. Much of their content was now coming from the internet and most of that experience was both multi-tasked and visual.

Linked to this attention deficit problem is the social challenge of Absent Presence. This is where you have, say, ten people sitting around a table, only to find that just five of whom are really 'present'. The others are mentally or emotionally out-to-lunch, as they sit texting, tweeting or instant-messaging other people in cyberspace. (Studies have shown that when this happens, people are often messaging other individuals who are in the room with them!)

Being constantly switched 'on' – as many of us are while our smartphones or tablets are in the room – also robs us of essential downtime for the brain. Research continues to show that the brain needs reflection time. Our minds need space to make sense of outside stimuli and add what we learn into long-term memory, where we can build upon it.

Over-exposure to the digital experience poses threats to physical health, too – not least among children. Last year researchers found that 40 percent of British children who own a mobile phone are sleep deprived. New research is suggests that a by-product of the digital experience is rising obesity among children, because of the sedentary lifestyle it encourages.

An increasing reliance on high-tech carries with it a growing need for high-touch; for self-restraint and a commitment to 'de-gadgetising' areas of our lives. In the end, each of us must decide whether or not we want to live in a Laschian world of digital media addiction.