Dr. Lidya

This is the video of the interview with Dr. Lidya:

The interview transcript:

Would you like to introduce yourself and the work you are doing?

My name is Lydia and I am a psychiatrist. I work in Smart Mind Center and a hospital in BSD for 10 years.

Have you ever got a patient that's addicted to social media?

I have some patients with social media addiction. It's about one patient in a week. Ten years ago, I don't see any social media-addicted patients at all, but in the two last years, I find out many teenagers are addicted to social media.

How did you help your addicted patients?

In the first meeting, I try to find out why they get this addition and what is the root cause. I find out their daily routine, the environment, and the symptoms that cause it like depression, anxiety, insecurity, overthinking and all about the psychological symptoms that affect social media addiction in the first meeting. After that, if we find there are many major symptoms, we sometimes give the medication, but if the addiction is mild, we just give the education and training for behavioral therapy to the patient, so the patient can handle if they deal this addiction.

What type of medicine do you give and what does it do to the brain of the addicted person?

We also find patients with social media addiction have other disorders in mental health issues. If they are diagnosed with depression, they cannot study, the loss of motivation, they cannot think clearly so we give medication anti-depression to cure the depression. If we have a common anxiety disorder, we give anti-anxiety medication. But if it’s mild and we don't give the medication. In this clinic, we also collaborate to manage this case. We not only see the psychiatrist but also the psychologist gives behavioral therapy and cognitive therapy we have therapists also here give play therapy because we know social media addiction, we cannot cut off suddenly or we cannot make the patient stop before they find the other activity and the other behavior, the good behavior. We first find what good behavior to replace social media addiction.

How often do you get patients who are addicted to social media?

This month we have more than 10 patients.

What do you think about social media addiction? Do you think it's a big issue in the world or is it a tiny issue?

It's the bigger issue because it's harmful. I think it's made so suddenly parents don’t recognize and the patient does not realize that is the addiction because people know addiction is like drugs, sex addiction, and the sugar addiction. But social media, if we cannot control it, it’s neurochemical, it's the behavior and the effects and impacts are also like other addictions.

How bad can social media addiction get? What's the worst case you have ever had about social media addiction?

I remember one patient. He got the suicidal thought after he was diagnosed with social media addiction for two years. He didn’t have friends anymore, he doesn’t want to study, he lost his appetite, loss of motivation, loss of focus, and no eagerness to study anymore and socialize, and he is in the room all day. I think his life it's only in social media, he lost real life, he lost the meaning of life, no purpose, no patience, and was very occupied with social media. Many people on social media don't think about what they not, maybe they are bullying. This makes them feel really insecure. Suddenly he wants to suicide.

How long does it usually take to cure social media addiction?

For a mild case, it may take at least 3 months. Why three months? Because we can build a new behavior in three months. We need 90 days to have the new behavior. For a major disorder or severe symptoms it needs long treatment.

How many check-ups does a patient usually have?

Once a week if this is a new patient. We meet at least once a week. We also collaborate. The psychiatrist, psychologist, and therapist because we have the packet of medication to one patient's medication. Social skill training, behavioral training, cognitive training, play therapy, and depends on the patient's needs.

What are the causes of social media addiction?

The causes are multifactorial. The external factor and internal factor. The external factor because the toxic people around the environment, maybe the people who get the social media election cannot accept it in the environment. So, they trying to find the other life in social media. They cannot accept it in this environment and they grab the bullying in the school. Another factor is not good parenting. The parents do not give quality time and the parents do not give education about social media. The internal factor because of the characteristic, the introvert personality is more likely to get addicted than the extrovert personality. They also have low self-esteem.

What are the impacts or effects of social media addiction?

In social media addiction we cannot control and we know this is the harm and negative, but we cannot escape from this. So, we call it an addiction. First, we have the tolerance, tolerance symptoms, we cannot cut off the time, but we are wasting our time on social media and we have also withdrawal symptoms. If we cut off social media, the patient becomes anxious, become frustrated stressful, and besides mental symptoms, they also have physical symptoms that we know about social media, we just sit down or maybe lay down and see social media. They don't have physical activity so they don't have a good immune system. They can easily have a disease. We can get impacted biologically, psychologically, and socially. Biologically is unhealthy, psychologically leads to mental breakdown, and your social life is decreased. All of the impacts are negative.

How does social media addiction damage the mental and physical state of people?

A person with social media addiction finds happiness in social media, but happiness can come from anything. But social media addicts focus on social media. Dopamine is the neurochemistry that makes us motivated, passionate. We just need 30 to 60 picograms per millilitre per minute in our blood. When we run, we have a good relationship, we talk with each other. We just need a small amount of dopamine to make us feel good. But if we open social media, the dopamine increases twice the times. Because of that, if the person feels bored, feel stressed, he remembers what instantly can make him feel good. So, he opens social media. He stopped the activity he is doing like learning and studying. We open social media to get instant pleasure, so it's not good for our brains because it's made the addition of dopamine to the reward system. So, we the person wants to find out happiness. We focus on the dopamine from social media. It's not good for the brain. It's not good for the character because we develop the personality and the character with the process not instantly, we try to learn about the pain. So, if you feel bad, you need social media.

What are some ways we can prevent social media addiction?

One of the solutions is like you do, trying to find out the knowledge. Give the education to people. Many people all around the world don't realize this harm, don't realize this impact. Because real life is better, better, and more beautiful than social media.

How much social media usage a day is considered addictive?

We only can use social media at least 30 minutes a day for good. If we use more than 3 hours, we cannot stop when while we do our jobs, activity, and activities.

Can you explain more about the connection between social media addiction and dopamine?

If we find a new picture in social media, the dopamine is high, but there is a good activity for dopamine because for good mental and physical exercise, the dopamine is high but the mind is mindful and released and physically they increase good metabolism and the immune system, the right oxygen. But in social media, the dopamine is high but the impact on the mind is not good because besides they learn about pleasure with social media. They find out the harmful impact like they compare themselves with others in social media. It makes them have low self-esteem they don't focus on themselves, but focus on the others and they want to become others. So, they're wasting time. They're wasting their time to find out what their purpose and their goals are in life. Because the social media and the people who always open social media, they also get depression symptoms because self-efficacy and self-esteem are built on the performance they perform in school and appreciation of people in real life, but in social media, we know it's not real life so maybe they want to find the likes and the good comments. It's not real. See preoccupies see they want to find that if they don't get it, they become frustrated. And he also finds fear of missing out. They try to open social media because what the new news, news, and like normal phobia, they suddenly get the entirety disorder if the mobile phone or their social media hack is hack error handphone, there is no Wi-Fi. We also find the patient with social media addiction. They lose their ability to self-care.

What do you think is the most used social media app or platform?

The most social media used app from my patients what I find the most is Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. I see the platform or application on social media if they want to get the appreciation and the friends' likes. Yeah, and TikTok, TikTok. But why do you think social media is an addiction? Because they designed it to make it an addiction. If we all people are addicted to social media, they get more the money from us.

Is social media addiction as harmful as any other types of addictions?

Yes, because of the neurochemical impact, the dopamine impact is similar to drug addiction and sex addiction. But we can easily harm reduction of the drugs. If we catch the drugs seller, the police and security can easily cut off the drugs. There are many medications in Indonesia with drug harm reduction. But we have we have not had social media rehabilitation for social media addiction and it's harder to cut off and control the patient because the social media in our mobile phones so easily to everybody. I have read the survey in the American psychologist research that 60% of the population has social media addiction. It increased after the pandemic because everybody was at home.

How many people do you think are addicted to social media in the whole world?

Yeah, maybe 60% and more. But I have read the most people that are addicted to social media are teenagers from 12-19 years old. Students are more addicted to social media.

What we learnt from Dr. Lidya
 

Dr. Lidya has a patient that’s addicted. 10 years ago, she never see a patient that’s addicted to social media. Dr. Lidya ask about their daily routine and symptoms that cause the patient to be addicted to social media. Dr. Lidya gave therapy to the patient so that they will be less addicted.

Dr. Lidya said she had more than 10 patients who are addicted to social media. Dr. Lidya thinks that social media addiction is harmful. Social media addiction is like drug addiction, sex addiction, etc.

One of Dr. Lidya's patient gets a suicidal thought when being addicted to social media. He doesn’t have any friends, doesn’t want to study, lost his appetite (doesn’t want to eat) and he usually spends time in his room all day. He lost the meaning of life because his mind is too obsessed with social media. 

Social media has good and bad impacts. There are mostly bad impacts. We have tolerance system. If we cut of social media, the patient gets stressful and have anxiety. They don’t have good immune system when they are spending too much time on social media.

The person who is addicted finds happiness to social media which is called dopamine. Dopamine is the feel-good chemical. But we still need the small amount of dopamine, but not too much of dopamine.

We can stop social media addiction by raising awareness. Telling people what harms your brain to be addicted and why is social media addiction such a big issue.

Dr. Lidya said you can use social media 30 minutes a day. If we use social media for over 3 hours, can’t stop, and keep thinking about social media means that you're addicted.

Some people compare themselves with other people in social media. They are wasting time and they are not focusing on themselves. Some people have YouTube channels, instagram page, tiktok page and they usually find likes, views and nice comments which makes them motivated to upload more.

Dr. Lidya’s patients mostly use Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok. They want to get more appreciation when they post videos or pictures. That is when the dopamine comes out.

Social media addiction is almost the same as drug addiction and other types of addiction. Dr. Lidya thinks 60% and more people are addicted to social media.

Dr Lidya: “We are trying to hear what happens and what are the problems inside of people who are addicted to social media. We are finding out what activities they like instead of looking at social media.”

Pictures from the interview: