Penny Sukhraj
13 October 2002
Johannesburg — THE typical South African Internet addict is not a pimply, bespectacled teenage boy. Instead, it is a young white girl who uses the Internet to chat up strangers and trawl porn sites.
A new study, involving more than 1 795 Internet users, has found that while males still mostly work in the information technology industry, young white women are more likely to become addicted to the Internet.
Internet addicts are people who spend as long as 13 hours on the Internet in one session.
The research was conducted by senior Wits University psychology lecturer Andrew Thatcher and Shamira Goolam, an industrial psychology consultant for Deloitte & Touche Human Capital Corporation.
Goolam said the researchers were surprised to find that, while males still dominated IT, addicts - who comprise less than 5% of Internet users - were mainly young women. She said the research showed that the white teenage female addict would get her fix wherever and whenever she could.
Goolam also said young females were likely to be engaged in more than one Internet activity at a time. "This means she could be searching for information for a project for university. At the same time, she might also be hopping from one chat room to another, while e-mailing new-found Net-buddies," she said .
And while the online exchanges could be innocent, they could just as likely be chatting up a stranger or exchanging information about porn sites .
Goolam said the research confirmed that young females were sexually explorative when using the Internet . "With the Internet comes the option of being anyone you want to be and you can choose whether you want to be coy or crude."
The study also showed that Internet addicts were unlikely to be black, coloured or Indian.
"Black people in South Africa, despite being the majority, also have the lowest degree of access to technology such as the Internet. They also have a low representation in the IT sector."
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