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10% of all high school students can't live without Internet: survey

34 Comments

The health ministry says that almost 10% of all high school students can't live without the Internet, according to the results of a questionnaire.

The questionnaire was given to 10,000 junior high school and high school students across Japan, TBS reported Friday. On the survey were questions such as "I feel irritated when I am asked to cut down on Net use" and "Using the Internet has got in the way of school or club activities."

According to the answers supplied by students, the ministry said that 5.9% of junior high school students and 9.4% of high school students are "dependent" on the Internet almost to the point of addiction. That figure, the ministry said, is four times higher than its figure for adults, which was arrived at using a similar questionnaire.

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34 Comments
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This it very good in my book.... because 90% of students can live without the Internet!

9 ( +12 / -3 )

Indeed, try to find a high school student without a phone and internet.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

I actually thought it would have been a lot higher than this.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

I agree. Only 10%?

3 ( +4 / -1 )

I'm pretty sure university students would be higher, and young adults as well. This is going to become a much greater problem in the future, as people of all ages can't put down their smartphones and tablets. Countless times, i have caught students using their phones in class, even though I warned them against using them. They just can't stop.

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

What do they mean by "Internet"? Does that include mobile phone as well?

I actually think that 10% is fairly low, and I think that may have to do with the fact that the Internet world in Japan is fairly stale and stagnant compared to the other countries. Go outside of Japan and practically all of the kids are playing some sort of an online game. In Japan, not so much.

There's also not so much of a "Web 2.0" presence in Japan: The only really popular social networking service is Twitter and maybe Mixi, but I think Mixi is fairly archaic. So people still largely rely on archaic message boards like 2chan.

2 ( +6 / -4 )

To echo others, that's it?

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

Funny thing is, many schools and businesses are resulting to Internet transactions and that doesn't help matters much either. But like it was mentioned by other posters, yeah ..... 10% seems way too low.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

I'm glad that I'm old enough that, if it became necessary, I could drop the Digital Age and go backto pencils and ledger books.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

'Net use' can mean a lot of things -- communicating with friends, commenting on forums, doing research, reading news, watching videos, etc. Not all of these activities are harmful to people. This study ends up concluding what we already know (at taxpayer expense no less): the Internet is a central part of people's lives and it's not going away.

Notice there are few complaints about TV addiction anymore? Although I'm no proponent of spending the entire day staring at any kind of screen, sitting in front of the tube is far more passive and antisocial. Which may be why TBS, NHK, etc are so keen to report these kinds of 'studies'. The Net cuts into their profits.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

What utter pap.

So the 10% would die without Internet?

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

But it's also true that 35.3% of junior high school students and 42.4% of high school students are preoccupied with the internet.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

And, 100% of JT registered are users are addicted to the net. :D

7 ( +7 / -0 )

I think its a mistake ... and supposed to read 10% of all high school students can live without internet.

Seriously though we all CAN, just we don't want to :D

0 ( +1 / -1 )

I do not believe only 10%, ask the parents of those High students to cut their internet for real then lets see.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

There's also not so much of a "Web 2.0" presence in Japan: The only really popular social networking service is >Twitter and maybe Mixi, but I think Mixi is fairly archaic. So people still largely rely on archaic message boards like >2chan.

What about 'LINE'? Line is hugely popular. Forget Mixi and Twitter. This is Japan and Line rules (I wish it didn't).

Most JHS and SHS kids couldn't live without Line. If the questionnaire has a 'Line' related question then the percentages quoted would be far far higher!

1 ( +1 / -0 )

10% of kids cannot leave??? What they gonna do then???Silly survey report..huh!!

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

What's the next survey and what's it gonna cost?

"25% of Tokyoites say watermelons are too expensive"

0 ( +0 / -0 )

If the net was gone, the kids would come back to life in a week.The article title should be "10% not alive because of the net"

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

"10% are brainless zombies because of the net", and much of the rest are just zombies.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

What 10% only? That's awful! A good education in today's world would require a good 80 to 95% usage of the net.

1 ( +2 / -1 )

What a stupid thing to say, especially for a headline. Of course they can live without it.

And the debate and worry about the issue is ho-hum as well, no? Isn't this the same thing that they used to say about rock music, the radio and tv?

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

This article doesn't really have an angle. Are you trying to imply that that's a high percentage or is it a low percentage? I can't tell what you want to say, but by my books that's actually super low in this day and age. I for one am extremely dependent on the internet to the point of addiction at this point, and I'm delighted to hear that others aren't in the same boat as me... At least, if they're telling the truth.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

10%? Sounds a bit of a lie to me. I assume they all need the internet for quick information instead of researching 100s of books at a library for a project. Let's be honest now.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

10 percent students can't survive without internet. The rest can manage with mobile phone e-learning.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Sounds like 90% of the students lied, lol.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

yep, it's actually about 80% , and that's quite low, considering that that's the future, 100%, like it or not. As with everything, kids can put to good or bad use their time on the internet, same as always. before internet, a kid could hang around with a gang and think up nasty things to do, or could make good.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

10% is really low. Here in the U.S. I would guess 90% to be the norm.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

OK ... got that ... so how about a survey asking high school students how many cannot live without their mobile phone? Hard to see a student walking down a street without that person checking out his/her phone.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

It seems they failed to realize that using mixi from your keitai still constitutes as Internet... in which case I'm sure the percentage of all high school students who would probably seek out death if they couldn't use it would sharply climb.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

It seems fairly clear that this report issued by the Health Ministry is designed to spur panic and concern amongst the general public.

But the first thing that struck me was the inherent error in placing any sort of weight regarding addiction on self-reported data, much less the self-reported data of teenagers who, by their very nature, tend to grossy overinflate the importance of many aspects of their day-to-day life.

Replace "internet usage" with "friends," "music," "games," and you would likely seem the same results.

That 90% of students report that they can live just fine without the Internet should be what this report should focus in, although again, the same flaws regarding anything having to do with self-reported real addiction would likely be inaccurate and thus wholly unreliable.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Nothing incredibly amazing about what is the norm for addictions in general. I believe (having read somewhere some long time ago) that this finding is in line with any other addictive tendency or behavior. About 10% of any population will have an addiction to alcohol, drugs, shopping, food, gambling and so on. The other 90% will not.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

This is a stupid poll and a waste of money.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Wait, so if we take away the internet, the students will suffer mass heart attacks? Medicine! Get on this!

0 ( +1 / -1 )

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