When the rent on his East Lansing, Mich., apartment is due, Mark Herberholz logs onto an Internet poker site for a few hands. He says the income from his winnings helps pay the bills and pass the time. The Michigan State senior says he spends about four hours a day playing computer games, instant messaging with friends and surfing the Internet.\nBut he spends only about six hours a week on the computer doing his homework.\nHerberholz is one of a growing number of college students spending hours a day at their computers for fun. But educators say the growing recreational use can interfere with studies and affect health and social development.\nAlthough alcohol is often blamed for low grades on campus, it ranked last in a 2004 survey by the American College Health Association of the top 10 impediments to academic performance. Only 8 percent of students on 74 campuses said alcohol got in the way of their studies, compared with 13 percent who reported computer gaming and Internet surfing as a problem. That's a jump from 9 percent in 2000, when the ACHA began recognizing it as a problem.\n"Internet use is one of the fastest growing concerns on campus," said Dennis Martell, MSU's health education coordinator, who studies the effects of computer use. "Some students report 7 to 8 hours a day of recreational use."\nIn 2003, more than 61 percent of 1,300 MSU undergrads surveyed said they spent three hours a day on the computer for recreation. The number of students reporting academic harm, such as lower grades or dropping a class, has jumped at MSU from about 9 percent in 2000 to 15 percent last year.\nUntil recently, Herberholz, 21, of Redford Township, said he sometimes would stay up all night playing Internet poker. "I would start at 8 p.m. and play through to morning," he said. "I was ... going to classes with no sleep."\nStudents today have grown up with computers and have sophisticated skills that have vastly expanded their ability to access information. College students account for 28 percent of all Internet users, according to national studies.\nProblems with computer use are often worse in dorms, where Internet connections are free and readily available, educators say. \nEllen Gold, director of Eastern Michigan University's Health Services, said advances in technology mean computers are everywhere -- in dorms, coffee shops, libraries -- and hard to avoid. \nGregg Gaddy points to his Dell Dimension computer tucked beneath his loft bed in a cramped room in MSU's Phillips Hall he calls "the janitor's closet."\n"This is the control center of my life," said Gaddy, 18, a freshman. "I find out who's available for dinner, who's looking for me and what's the big headline."\nGaddy says he spends about 30 minutes on the computer while he's eating breakfast in his room, checking e-mail and browsing the Internet. When he's not in class, he works 18 hours a week, mostly on the computer, for the information technology department at MSU's Olin Health Center. He spends about 30 minutes a day on computers for his studies.\nAfter classes he checks e-mail, goes to dinner, then heads back to his computer about 8 p.m. While he's reading a textbook, he's also instant messaging. Sometimes he'll play the computer game "Half-Life 2," shooting aliens to relieve stress. On an average day, he'll spend three to four hours on the computer for fun.\n"I'll read and be online for the rest of the night sitting next to the computer," Gaddy said. "It's a little distracting, but I'd be sitting here anyway, and this way I don't go stir crazy. I have someone to talk to. I'm meeting people online at MSU that I wouldn't otherwise meet."\nGaddy has 91 people, including 44 from MSU, in his account with www.Thefacebook.com, a site for college students to post personal information to share with other people they meet online.\n"My social life is a jillion times better than without Facebook and the computer. The joke on campuses is that Facebook is addicting like crack. It's a little creepy, but it breaks down social barriers."\nThe problem of excessive use is worse among men than women: 20 percent of men reported it harmed them academically, while 10 percent of women did, according to the 2004 ACHA survey.\nBut girls are not immune to the lure of the computer. Katie Winsemius, a sophomore at EMU, said she spends about three hours a day using the computer for recreation. As a transfer student, she found it hard to meet people.\n"I took up knitting to force myself to sit in a different chair to get away from the computer," said Winsemius, 19, of Spring Lake. The habit she says "is like why people smoke." But Winsemius said her computer doesn't keep her from going out when she wants to.\nFor Andy Meier, the resident mentor on Gaddy's corridor in Phillips Hall, using computers properly is a question of balance. \n"Whether you're watching TV, reading a book or doing homework, the computer is always there, and it's easy to slip into."
t Lansing. "It's easy to do research, but then someone comes over and you play a game. ... I've seen kids up until 7 a.m. playing a video console game with headsets on. You could argue that it's decreasing their physical and academic health and retarding their social development."\nBut Meier also has fond memories of playing video computer games during his junior year in his resident mentor's room. "He had every computer game available, and six people would pile onto a futon with common interests, and we also talked about more serious things," he said. "It was such a welcoming area that it became a gathering place. It was an example of video games building community"
