Am I Addicted to Something?

Video Games, Tv Series and Social Media. It Seems That Many of Us Are Hooked on Something. But Are Things as Bad as They Appear?

- Dr Suzi Gage

The media is full of reports of addiction to pornography, gambling, video games, phones and even the internet. Parents are concerned that they can’t drag their kids away from their tablets, while on any public transport journey you can see dozens of people mindlessly scrolling. But are we as hooked on these behaviours as the stories make out? And most importantly: are levels of addiction on the rise, as technological advances put these enjoyable temptations in our pockets? Certainly, data collected by UK government body the Gambling Commission suggests that problem gambling behaviours are on the rise, estimating in 2017 that approximately 430,000 individuals in the UK had a serious gambling problem, a rise of more than one-third over the previous three years. It’s perhaps not surprising: whereas once you’d have to go down to the betting shop or off to a bingo hall if you fancied a flutter, now you can simply download an app.

Defining addiction

Addiction is a term that we hear all the time, but it’s a surprisingly tricky concept to pin down. Colloquially, we might say things like: “Oh, I downloaded this new game on my phone and I’m totally addicted to it.” But from a clinical perspective, we think of addiction as occurring when someone has found that their life – whether it’s their relationships with friends or family, their ability to perform their job, or something else – has been knocked off-kilter by a compulsion to perform a behaviour.

In the past, the perception has been that addiction only occurs due to regular heavy use of a substance, like tobacco, alcohol or an illegal drug. But a lot of what causes dependence on a drug is psychological rather than biological.

Prof Robert West, director of tobacco studies at University College London and editor-in-chief of the journal