Professional Students’ Use of Ict: Healthy?

Abstract
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has become the world’s most important infrastructure. ICT has also been biggest cause of physical, social and mental health problems of individuals. The main objective of this paper is to study the ICT usage pattern of professional students and identify the health problems in them due to their ICT usage. In this study I have referred ‘Professional Students’ to those students who are pursuing professional studies – Management, Medicine, Dental Medicine, Physiotherapy, Pharmacy and Nursing. Survey method was used for the study. Questions related to demographics, ICT usage, awareness of health hazards due to ICT, association of ICT with depression and anxiety among students were asked. The aim of this paper is to investigate whether ICT use in professional education is healthy or unhealthy.

Keywords
ICT, Professional Students, Physical Health, Mental Health, Social Health, Depression, Anxiety, Dependence, Addiction.

Introduction
It is quite difficult rather impossible to imagine life without technology. Modern technologies such as ICT have helped many of the development sectors like education, finance and banking, government, and what not. One of the vital sector, it has lot of scope to develop is Health. Along with certain number of benefits, technology follows with some loopholes. According to many studies, indeed, ICT has been proved as life saver in the field of health. ICT has rising advancements. According to Vic Hayes, considered to be father of Wireless Technology, ‘India is emerging as a hot Wi-Fi destination and its wide range of applications can only be imagined in times to come’. Very recent news to support his statement is that the newly constructed Ahmedabad Airport will have WiFi and VoIP services for commuters. Be connected while waiting for your flight. ICT brings connectivity with the world and it is the major reason why youth are found to be associated with the social networking

References: • Bimber, (2000). The gender gap on the Internet. Social Science Quarterly. 81, (3), 868-876. • Chen, P. Liu, S., & Luo, L. (2007). A study on the psychological health of Internet addiction disorder of college students. Chinese Journal of Clinical Psychology, 15, 40-41. • Clark, J. (2006). “The Impact Of ICT On Health, Healthcare And Nursing In The Next 20 Years” Paper presented to NI2006 Seoul, Korea. • Cummings, J • Finn and Inman, (2004). Digital unity and digital divide: surveying alumni to study effects of a campus laptop initiative. Journal of Research on Technology in Education. 36, (3), 297-317. • Glotz, P., & Bertsch, S. (Eds.). (2005). Thumb Culture: The Meaning of Mobile Phones for Society. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers. • Gordon, C • Huang, Z., Wang, M., Qian, M., Zhong, J., & Tao, R. (2007). Chinese Internet addiction inventory: Developing a Measure of problematic Internet use for Chinese college students. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 10, 805-922. • Huang, Y • Jo, P. “Perspectives of ICT in professional development and education” Information Services and Use.(Vol 19, No. 4), (1999): 307-312 • Kumar, R • Lanthier, R. P., & Windham, R. C. (2004). Internet use and college adjustment: The moderating role of gender. Computers in Human Behavior, 20, 591-606. • Lee, K • Mohammad Reza Hanafizadeh , Abbas Saghaei , Payam Hanafizadeh, (2009). An index for cross-country analysis of ICT infrastructure and access, Telecommunications Policy, v.33 n.7, p.385-405. • Morgan, C • Royal Society (2006) Digital healthcare:The impact of information and communication technologies on health and healthcare. London. Royal Society.Scottish Executive (2004) National eheath/IM&T Strategy 2004-2008 • Sonar, G.B • Wireless Healthcare (2005).101 Things to do with a mobile phone in healthcare. Steinkrug Publications Ltd. • Young, K. (2006). Surfing not studying: Dealing with Internet addiction on campus. Center for Online Addiction. Retrieved on April 30, 2008, from http://www.netaddiction.com/articles/surfing_not_studying.pdf • Zain et al., (2004) 2. Networking sites, emailing, texting may prove injurious to public health, Available at: http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal. Accessed September 29th, 2009.