On May 7, China Youth Daily reported on the original treatment model for Internet addiction, “electroshock treatment for Internet addiction” (also known as “brain-awakening therapy”), which was created by Dr. Yang Yongxin of the Psychiatric Hospital in Linyi City, Shandong Province. The report reported that Dr. Yang Yongxin, a psychiatrist at the Linyi Psychiatric Hospital in Shandong Province, had developed an original model for treating Internet addiction – “electroshock treatment for Internet addiction” (also known as “brain-awakening therapy”), in which electrodes are connected to the temples or fingers of Internet addicted children to stimulate the brain with electric current. This report caused a public outcry. The electroshock treatment technique for Internet addiction instantly became the benchmark for many Internet addiction treatments. At the same time, questions from medical experts, legal professionals and netizens came one after another and in droves. In July, the Ministry of Health, after organizing experts to study and demonstrate the problems associated with electroshock treatment of Internet addiction, officially issued a notice saying that the safety of “electroshock treatment of Internet addiction” technology is not yet exact and should not be used in clinical practice, so the clinical application of the therapy should be stopped. Although the Ministry of Health urgently called a halt to the treatment of Internet addiction, but the debate about this treatment method did not end with it, but has caused more people’s attention. In order to quit their children’s Internet addiction, parents did not die, after experiencing a variety of failed treatment methods, they still electroshock treatment for Internet addiction as the last straw to save their children. In the past few days, the “Health Weekly” column has received a number of text messages from readers asking whether electroshock treatment for Internet addiction is effective. What is electroshock treatment for internet addiction? Is it effective or not? What are the effects on patients? For the focus of these discussions, the reporter recently interviewed the city’s experts. Neurosurgery experts: electroshock treatment of Internet addiction effect to be verified. Zhang Li: director of neurosurgery at Taihe Hospital, has a doctorate in neurosurgery from Huashan Hospital of Fudan University in Shanghai, and is one of the earliest medical doctors in the field of neurosurgery in the city. For electroshock treatment of Internet addiction, tension said he has been concerned. He said that electroshock therapy is not a new treatment method, as early as the 1930s and 1940s, there are some developed countries in Europe and the United States will be applied to the treatment of mental illness, due to the inaccurate efficacy and trauma, in the 1970s and 1980s has stopped applying. However, there are still some countries, including China, where electroshock therapy is still used on a small scale to treat patients with mental illness. According to Zhang Li, there are at least two areas where Yang Yongxin’s use of electroshock therapy for Internet addiction needs to be questioned: one is whether Internet addiction belongs to the category of mental illness or psychological illness. Obviously, Internet addiction belongs to the latter category, and electroshock therapy is generally used for patients with mental illnesses. The second is whether electroshock treatment for Internet addiction is effective or not. “I noticed that there is currently propaganda claiming that electroshock treatment for Internet addiction has significant effects, but in fact the effectiveness of electroshock treatment for Internet addiction is lacking in scientific data to confirm.” Zhang Li believes that a method that lacks exact confirmation of efficacy is clearly undesirable to be applied clinically in a big way. Psychological experts: Internet addiction needs to be treated with psychotherapy Feng Jincai: psychotherapist at the Rehabilitation Medicine Center of Taihe Hospital, has studied psychology for two years at the China Rehabilitation Research Center and the Institute of Psychology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and participated in advanced intensive training for psychotherapists at Peking University, with extensive experience in psychotherapy and psychological counseling. For Yang Yongxin’s electroshock treatment of Internet addiction, Feng Jincai pointed out that this method is also known as “electrical stimulation aversion therapy”. Aversion therapy is a method of eliminating maladaptive behaviors through punitive stimulation. When a patient has a bad behavior, a certain stimulus is given immediately to make the patient have a painful aversion reaction, such as giving electrical stimulation, drug induced vomiting, etc., to establish a conditioned reflex between the bad behavior and the aversion reaction, and eventually make the patient give up the original behavior. Feng Jincai believes that applying electroshock therapy to the field of Internet addiction, a mental illness, can cause great psychological harm to children. Internet addiction is a manifestation of a child’s lack of psychological needs, such as feeling neglected by parents in real life, lack of respect and a sense of belonging, etc., and then seeking comfort or venting in the virtual world. Therefore, in order to make children quit Internet addiction, the root of treatment should start from these missing psychological needs. It would be irresponsible for parents to simply hand their children over to electroshock therapists. “Room 13, a place I will never forget for the rest of my life, where for the first time I felt the feeling of a million swords through my heart, and it was worse than death when I was electrocuted.” Xiao Yu, who had experienced electroshock therapy, still has palpitations when he hears the number 13 ……