GEN: LM_NET not "sad, lonely world in cyberspace"

[Alice Yucht <AliceInfo@AOL.COM>]

According to a front page article in the Sunday, August 30, 1998 New York
Times, *Researchers Find Sad, Lonely World in Cyberspace*

<< In the first concentrated study of the social and psychological effects of
Internet use at home, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have found
that people who spend even a few hours a week online experience higher levels
of depression and loneliness than they would have if they used the computer
network less frequently. .... Internet use itself appeared to cause a decline
in psychological well-being, the researchers said.
[snip] "We were shocked by the findings, because they are counterintuitive to
what we know about how socially the Internet is being used," said Robert
Kraut, a social psychology professor at Carnegie Mellon's Human Computer
Interaction Institute. "We are not talking here about the extremes. These were
normal adults and their families, and on average, for those who used the
Internet most, things got worse." >>

The complete article is available at
http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/98/08/biztech/articles/30depression.html

Well, it's certainly obvious that the researchers didn't interview any
LM_NETters, because most of us depend on this forum to share resources as a
hedge against depression and  to combat professional loneliness!

Alice H. Yucht, M.L.S., B.L.P.
Heritage Middle School
Livingston, NJ
AliceInfo@aol.com

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