Kuss DJ, Lopez-Fernandez O. Internet addiction and problematic Internet use: A systematic review of clinical research. World J Psychiatr 2016; 6(1): 143-176 [PMID: 27014605 DOI: 10.5498/wjp.v6.i1.143]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Dr. Daria J Kuss, International Gaming Research Unit, Nottingham Trent University, Burton St, Nottingham NG1 4BU, United Kingdom. daria.kuss@ntu.ac.uk
Research Domain of This Article
Psychiatry
Article-Type of This Article
Systematic Reviews
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Psychiatr. Mar 22, 2016; 6(1): 143-176 Published online Mar 22, 2016. doi: 10.5498/wjp.v6.i1.143
Internet addiction and problematic Internet use: A systematic review of clinical research
Daria J Kuss, Olatz Lopez-Fernandez
Daria J Kuss, International Gaming Research Unit, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham NG1 4BU, United Kingdom
Olatz Lopez-Fernandez, Laboratory for Experimental Psychopathology, Psychological Sciences Research Institute, Université Catholique de Louvain, 1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium
Author contributions: Kuss DJ performed the literature search and both authors contributed to the final write-up of the manuscript.
Supported by A grant from the European Commission (“Tech Use Disorders”; Grant ID: FP7-PEOPLE-2013-IEF-627999) awarded to Olatz Lopez-Fernandez.
Conflict-of-interest statement: No potential conflicts of interest relevant to this article were reported.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Daria J Kuss, International Gaming Research Unit, Nottingham Trent University, Burton St, Nottingham NG1 4BU, United Kingdom. daria.kuss@ntu.ac.uk
Telephone: +44-115-8484153 Fax: +44-115-8484153
Received: August 29, 2015 Peer-review started: September 6, 2015 First decision: October 27, 2015 Revised: November 19, 2015 Accepted: January 5, 2016 Article in press: January 7, 2016 Published online: March 22, 2016
Core Tip
Core tip: Internet addiction has appeared as new mental health concern. To date, reviews have focused on clinical and treatment studies of Internet addiction and Internet Gaming Disorder, limiting the analysis to a specific diagnosis of a potential disorder that has not yet been officially recognised, rather than a comprehensive investigation of Internet-use related addictions (including problematic Internet use) more generally. This systematic literature review outlines and discusses the current empirical literature base for clinical studies of Internet addiction and problematic Internet use. A total of 46 relevant studies on treatment seeker characteristics, psychopharmacotherapy, psychological therapy, and combined treatment were identified.
