Internet Addiction: Too Much Time Online? Kids' ages 8 to 18 now spend an average of 10 hours and 45 minutes a day, seven days a week with media. That translates into 75 hours and 15 minutes per week, nearly twice as many hours as their parents put into full-time jobs according to research published by the Kaiser Family Foundation in January 1010 Media Use Over Time 147 TV content Video games 143 TOTAL MEDIA 10 45 Muhttasking proportion TOTAL MEDSAUSE Courme: Kolsa Famly Feonderen snudy January 2010 Within these averages there are significant differences and knowing where your child or teen falls within these ranges is the first step in understanding whether or not you want to adjust the amount of time they spend online, or if you suspect a larger problem is brewing. A full 21% of youth are defined as heavy media users who spend more than 16 hours with media a day Another 63% are defined as moderate users who use media 3-16 hours a day. Youth who fall into the light user category are those who consume less than 3 hours of media a day For youth on the high end of the scale, spending this much time with media and offline robs them of real world experiences may result in lower grades, increase their risk for and depression, cut into the time needed for sleep, and more of those media hours, the internet now takes up about half of the time. For most kids and teens their online use is relatively well managed as they balance media use with school, sports, friends, and other commitments. Yet for a small percentage of youth the need to be online can become compulsive, uncontrolled, or pathological, this type of maladaptive behavior is sometimes called internet addiction' Whether compulsive internet use fits into formal category of addiction or not, there is clear the evidence demonstrating that some users develop a compulsive need to be online that interferes with their daily activities, their relationships, and their health Though researchers are far from fully understanding the cause and effect relationship between internet use and maladaptive r (and to the extent these relationships may run both ways), evidence suggest that the k to youth for developing these issues is much greater than it is for older users