Addiction and volition in problematic Internet use among college students

Exclusive use of the paradigm of mechanistic determination may be inappropriate for the systematic study of human beings in psychology. There have been some studies that have attempted to use a framework which makes teleological explanations possible while maintaining scientific empirical rigor. This type of study could prove especially helpful in the fields where the existence of volitional control for a particular behavior is debated. Internet use and abuse is such a field. Addiction, or lack of volitional control, is central to the fervor over Internet use and mental health. Internet use is also a field which has rarely been studied empirically. Using a relatively new teleological methodology, Internet use is shown to be a volitional behavior for most members of a non-clinical population. Participants were assessed according to a battery of Internet addiction scales to determine which, if any, of the tests can predict lack of volitional control of Internet use. No test was able to reliably predict lack of volitional control.