OU Junior Struggles with Internet Addiction

by Nick Kovach
Staff Writer

Ohio University junior Evan Peres bought a new computer over the summer, hoping it would help him Fall Quarter with his business cluster, a demanding series of classes required for all business majors. But soon, Peres began to spend more and more time on the Internet - to the point of an addiction.

The intensive nature of the business cluster's out-of-class and on-line workload forced Peres to spend large amounts of time hunting the Internet for research, because much of the business world now takes place on-line.

"I'd spend at least two or three hours a day on-line researching for the cluster," he said. "You had to stay ahead in the classes."

He began spending more and more time working on-line because of both the large amounts of research required for his classes and also his developing affinity for Napster. He said he began to spend large periods of time in his room with the door shut to the world, only emerging every few hours to attend class, meetings and meals.

"Anyone who tells you Napster is not addictive has never used it. The amount of music available is incredible. It's easy to find something you want to download," he said.

"I realized I was spending significant amounts of time on-line and isolating myself in my room," Peres said. "But I wasn't aware of the severity of my actions."

Peres said his friends starting noticing his absence.

"Evan was under a lot a stress and his overuse of Napster was only contributing to the problem," said his roommate, senior Tim Smith. "It became obvious something was affecting Evan besides the cluster."

Smith said he remembers one afternoon when Peres, usually a reserved and overly kind person, snapped at a visitor using the telephone, "Can you get off the phone? Some people have to use the Internet today."

"It really came out of nowhere," Smith said. "After it happened we were kind of shocked, but it didn't take long to piece things together."

Peres said he spent the remainder of the quarter and Christmas break divorcing himself from Napster-and Internet Addiction Disorder.

"I took my computer home over Christmas break, but it pretty much just collected dust. Like most people, I worked the entire time I was home, so there wasn't much time for Napster." According to friends, Peres is back to his old self.

"The Internet is so addictive because you have tons of information at your fingertips whenever you want or need it," Peres said. " My problem was small. I have heard of people losing their families and friends over this. Now I know that Internet Addiction Disorder is a real condition."