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Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up
Severe social withdrawal, including staying alone in one’s bedroom, non-attendance at school or work, and minimal or absent social contacts, sometimes only through electronic devices, can be found in several psychiatric disorders, or in a ‘primary’ form, firstly defined in Japan as ‘Hikikomori’. The...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
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MDPI
2023
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10605260/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37892332 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/children10101669 |
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author | Tolomei, Greta Masi, Gabriele Milone, Annarita Fantozzi, Pamela Viglione, Valentina Narzisi, Antonio Berloffa, Stefano |
author_facet | Tolomei, Greta Masi, Gabriele Milone, Annarita Fantozzi, Pamela Viglione, Valentina Narzisi, Antonio Berloffa, Stefano |
author_sort | Tolomei, Greta |
collection | PubMed |
description | Severe social withdrawal, including staying alone in one’s bedroom, non-attendance at school or work, and minimal or absent social contacts, sometimes only through electronic devices, can be found in several psychiatric disorders, or in a ‘primary’ form, firstly defined in Japan as ‘Hikikomori’. The distinction between primary and secondary forms is questionable, as it prevalently depends on the quality of psychiatric assessment. To date, few studies specifically explored Hikikomori in an adolescent population outside Japan. The aim of the present study is to describe clinical features of a consecutive group of 80 referred youth (13 to 18 years, 57 males) with social isolation, of which 40 were followed up on for 4–6 months, to characterize clinical features and outcome. All the participants presented psychiatric comorbid disorders, prevalently anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and autism spectrum disorder. Suicidality (ideation and behavior) was reported in 32.5% of the participants, and 20% of the participants attempted suicide. More than half of the participants exceeded the cut-off of the Internet Addiction Test, and 42.4% met the criteria for the Internet Gaming Disorder. At the follow-up appointment, an improvement of social withdrawal was reported in 75% of the sample; 67.5% of the participants significantly improved according to the CGI-improvement scale; and 55% of the participants had an improvement of functioning according to the C-GAS. Our findings suggest that Hikikomori is a transnosographic entity, with high rates of suicidality and Internet addiction, and that can it improve when it is timely diagnosed and treated. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-10605260 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2023 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-106052602023-10-28 Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up Tolomei, Greta Masi, Gabriele Milone, Annarita Fantozzi, Pamela Viglione, Valentina Narzisi, Antonio Berloffa, Stefano Children (Basel) Article Severe social withdrawal, including staying alone in one’s bedroom, non-attendance at school or work, and minimal or absent social contacts, sometimes only through electronic devices, can be found in several psychiatric disorders, or in a ‘primary’ form, firstly defined in Japan as ‘Hikikomori’. The distinction between primary and secondary forms is questionable, as it prevalently depends on the quality of psychiatric assessment. To date, few studies specifically explored Hikikomori in an adolescent population outside Japan. The aim of the present study is to describe clinical features of a consecutive group of 80 referred youth (13 to 18 years, 57 males) with social isolation, of which 40 were followed up on for 4–6 months, to characterize clinical features and outcome. All the participants presented psychiatric comorbid disorders, prevalently anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and autism spectrum disorder. Suicidality (ideation and behavior) was reported in 32.5% of the participants, and 20% of the participants attempted suicide. More than half of the participants exceeded the cut-off of the Internet Addiction Test, and 42.4% met the criteria for the Internet Gaming Disorder. At the follow-up appointment, an improvement of social withdrawal was reported in 75% of the sample; 67.5% of the participants significantly improved according to the CGI-improvement scale; and 55% of the participants had an improvement of functioning according to the C-GAS. Our findings suggest that Hikikomori is a transnosographic entity, with high rates of suicidality and Internet addiction, and that can it improve when it is timely diagnosed and treated. MDPI 2023-10-09 /pmc/articles/PMC10605260/ /pubmed/37892332 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/children10101669 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Article Tolomei, Greta Masi, Gabriele Milone, Annarita Fantozzi, Pamela Viglione, Valentina Narzisi, Antonio Berloffa, Stefano Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title | Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title_full | Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title_fullStr | Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title_full_unstemmed | Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title_short | Hikikomori (Severe Social Withdrawal) in Italian Adolescents: Clinical Features and Follow-Up |
title_sort | hikikomori (severe social withdrawal) in italian adolescents: clinical features and follow-up |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10605260/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37892332 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/children10101669 |
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