Bipolar disorder affects behavior and social skills on the Internet.
BACKGROUND
Bipolar disorder (BD) is a significant cause of functional, cognitive, and social impairment. However, classic studies of functioning and social skills have not investigated how BD may impact behavior on the Internet. Given that the digital age has been changing the way people communicate, this study aims to investigate the pattern of Internet use in patients with BD.


METHODS
This cross-sectional study assessed 30 patients with BD I or II and 30 matched controls. Patients were not in an acute mood episode, according to DSM-IV. A standard protocol examined sociodemographic variables and social behavior on the Internet, assessed by Facebook number of friends (FBN) and lifetime estimated number of offline contacts (social network number, SNN).


RESULTS
SNN (p<0.001) and FBN (p = 0.036) of patients with BD were significantly lower than those of controls. Also, variables related with Internet use were significantly lower in patients, e.g., close contacts on Facebook (p = 0.021), Internet experience (p = 0.020), and knowledge of terms associated with social networking sites (p = 0.042). Also, patients showed lower rates of the expected pattern of Internet use (based on their age generation), including a poorer knowledge of SNS (p = 0.018) and a lower frequency of Internet use (p = 0.010).


CONCLUSIONS
This study suggests that patients with BD show smaller social networks both in real-world settings and on the Internet. Also, patients tend to use the Internet and social networking sites less frequently and show a poorer knowledge of Internet and social media than healthy controls, below the expected for their generation. These significant differences between patients and controls suggest that the effects of BD on social relationships and functioning extend to electronic media.
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Ciências Médicas: Psiquiatria, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil ; Laboratory of Molecular Psychiatry, Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Instituto Nacional de Ciências e Tecnologia Translacional em Medicina, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Thaís
T
Martini
Letícia Sanguinetti
LS
Czepielewski
Adam
A
Fijtman
Leonardo
L
Sodré
Bianca
B
Wollenhaupt-Aguiar
Caroline Silveira
CS
Pereira
Mireia
M
Vianna-Sulzbach
Pedro D
PD
Goi
Adriane Ribeiro
AR
Rosa
Flavio
F
Kapczinski
Maurício
M
Kunz
Marcia
M
Kauer-Sant'anna
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001714:Bipolar Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007360:Intelligence; D020407:Internet; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011788:Quality of Life; D012919:Social Behavior; D055815:Young Adult