Wellness with Wood: Digital Addiction
All right, technology helps us in many ways, but how do you we know when it’s becoming harmful to our well-being? Dr. Charlotta Dennis, medical director of behavioral health at Priority Health, is here to talk about digital addiction. I love your dress. We did not plan this, by the way. I love yours, too. So, first, what is digital addiction and how do you know when you are a digital addict? Digital addiction is not unlike other forms of addiction. So people have excessive use of digital formats whether it’s your telephone, whether it’s your iPad, your computer. It’s using technology excessively and it can come with symptoms like irritability. You can have some form of withdrawal symptoms. Sometime sometimes people can get sad or anxious when their digital products are not right in front of them. So you notice there’s an issue when there’s trouble with impaired sleep, your mood um goes ary and you don’t want to be without your digital format. How common is digital addiction? It is very common. The numbers are rising and ever since the uh global pandemic um there has been an increase in use of digital uh digital equipment um because people were not meeting regularly in front of one another. So, the use has increased. The CDC is actually recommending uh people under two years of age, no screen time at all. Children ages 2 to five, about one hour. And people ages 5 to 17, about two hours of controlled uh digital use. And Dr. Dennis, there are different types of digital addiction. For instance, like online shopping, even information overload. Absolutely. Since the age of uh social media, everything is at your fingertips. So, you want to limit the exposure to what you’re looking at and sites are not often controlled. So, what you pick up may not be truthful. It may not be um it may not be controlled by resources that are readily available in truth. Well, it makes us want to be so close to the screen all the time. I think because everything when when you have something that’s readily available when you’re on the go, you can have your phone. It’s easy to tuck away, but it’s also easy to look up whatever it is you need to look up. Whether it’s directions, whether it’s a recipe, when it’s at your fingertips, it makes it so easily accessible. So, we use it accessibly. What can happen when you take a break from social media, the internet for a few days? you can find rest and relaxation. Actually, people do not they typically do not know how much time they’re actually spending with social media, with, you know, laptops, with games, unless they’re tracking it. And when you take a break from it, you notice that you can get refreshed and you really feel as though you can have a connection to people personally rather than being behind the screen. How do you break a digital addiction especially with your kids? First is monitoring the use. You have to understand what the use is before you can say how we can change it. So excessive use. You you make sure that you’re monitoring what’s happening, but you also lead by example. So if you have small children in the home, they shouldn’t see you on your phone on your laptop all day. Make it intentional to have breaks and have scheduled breaks. Cut alarms off, you know, set times for the youth. Yeah. Lead by example. I have a rule at my house, for myself at least, no phone for a couple hours before bed. That really does help. It does. Awesome. Anything else that you want to share resources at Priority Health about this topic? Absolutely. Yes. If you are in need of any behavioral health assistance, our behavioral health team is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We do have a landing page on priorityhealth.com. Awesome. Thank you so much for being here with us, Dr. Dennis. Yes. Thanks for having me.
Technology helps us in may ways, but how do we know when it’s becoming harmful to our well being? (May 6, 2025)
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