It's a fact, a fact you can confirm by visiting almost any forum on the net but a fact many people (for reasons too numerous to go into here) that a vastly disproportionate number of people who reguarly use the internet have clinicly diagnosed mental conditions. Be it Game FAQ's.com or AishHA Torah, it's inevitable that half the people you meet will have a severe, diagnosed mental condtion and huge quantities of medication for it, and that the site will have at least one (highly popular) thread for discussing medication or comparing diagnosis. The most common diagnosis seems to be OCD, followed by Bipolar and then Schizophrenia, the mood disorders coming in above the lesser mental illnesses (ADHD and Autism) who's sufferers probably don't want to mention their diagnoses or feel it nescicary; the diagnosed never appear to come from Europe.

While the correlation between mental illness and internet usage (like that between Schizophrenia and smoking Cannabis) is clear, One Big Question remains, and that (again like the correlation between Schizophrenia and smoking Cannabis use) is which facto causes which.

It could be that, to reguarly use the internet you MAKES YOU clinicly insane; scholars seem to favour this view, that some property of the internet promotes insane behaviours in real life. The lack of restrictions on what you can say leads people to truely be themselves in all their unrestrained insanity and then carry this into their real/estrained social lives, the lack of physical identities leads to an overly philosophical questioning of truths not seen as sane in this day and age, certain internet behaviours such as sock-puppeting and ironic outbursts promolte the spread of insanity. These are all blamed reguarly and without mercy.

On the other hand, it could be said that to reguarly use the net, you MUST ALREADY be clinicly insane; some property of the internet attracts clinicly insane people. Evidence for this includes, that mental illnesses arn't thought of as things you can "learn" from your environment by most psychologists and neurologists, that many people are already diagnosed with mental disorders before they first log on, that some of the symptoms promote behaviour encountered often online (such as sock puppeting) and that as there is no discrimination online many wouild be drawn to that.

It could even be, that a third factor is causing both, or that they both have a cuasative effect on one another. Help me answer this vital question regarding the net and insanity, please!

--
Introverted (I) 51.61% Intuitive (N) 73.53% Thinking (T) 62.16% Perceiving (P) 53.49% like only 3.3% of the populace.