It's a sad day when you gauge your popularity by how many people like your status on Facebook or by the number of comments you receive on your newly updated profile picture. The amount of time we spent online in 2009 averaged more than 5 hours a day, according to a report by the Nielsen Company. Suffice it to say, the Internet has successfully consumed copious amounts of our time through its irresistible buffet of social networking sites like Facebook, discovery engines such as StumbleUpon and microblogs like Tumblr.

Whether you're tethered to your laptop, phone, iPod or all three, dependence on technology has permeated every aspect of our lives. Prior to this, computers were merely for the invention of making data processing and collecting easier; now, the same invention mechanizes and substitutes real human connections and interactions.

The presence of the constant stimulation of texting and instant messaging will undoubtedly leave an impression on the users' social and emotional health. Social disconnectedness due to technology is a documented issue, as corroborated by several American College Health Association studies over the years. I believe that the possible consequences of this constant stimulation are the severe psychological problems recently seen affecting more and more college students.

According to a study of 424 campus counseling centers by the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors, 77 percent of the centers surveyed indicated that they saw an increase in the number of students with severe mental health issues like depression, eating disorders, sleep disorders, severe anxiety and substance abuse over the past year. For the first time since 2006, anxiety surpassed depression as the most commonly reported psychological problem among college students.

Moreover, a corresponding national study of first-year students conducted last year by the University of California, Los Angeles found that only 51.9 percent of incoming students believed themselves to be in good to above-average emotional health, the lowest recorded percentage since 1985.

While there is no apparent reason for the steady increase in mental health issues among college students, it's possible that declining emotional health is caused by this dependence on technology. Researchers in Australia and China conducted a study last year observing pathological Internet use and its effect on the mental health of 1,041 teenage students. Nine months after the study began, 87 individuals were diagnosed with depression and eight displayed symptoms of severe anxiety. Given the results of the study, researchers concluded that those who identify themselves as Internet addicts are 2.5 times more likely to become depressed.

Further, a survey last year from the International Center for Media and Public Agenda at the University of Maryland illustrated the psychological consequences of being too connected to technology. The study asked 200 students to give up all media, including Facebook, iPods, e-mail, instant messaging and texting for 24 hours.

Likening the experience to "solitary confinement," students explained in blogs after the study that in today's age, the wires of technology and everyday life are so closely interwoven that giving up technological communication is comparable to losing one's social life. One of the main sources of anxiety of the 200 students during that 24-hour period was being without information, whether it be the news or what happened on the latest episode of The Office. Most interestingly, without access to text messaging or Facebook, the students felt incredibly disconnected and alone.

These results are largely unsurprising; it's difficult to make the case that spending hours online or texting obsessively are healthy habits. If students are claiming they feel alone and socially disconnected without the ability to text their friends, one can assume that their emotional health is negatively impacted by their dependence on technology.

While there is no study illustrating a direct relationship between the amount of time students spend using technology and the mental issues they later develop, it is certainly a legitimate theory when one considers the overlapping psychological problems currently documented among college students and the problems caused by excessive use of technology. Though this increase in psychological issues afflicting college students is not exclusively linked to their obsession with media, the dependence is possibly a contributing factor.

But would this reliance necessarily trigger the psychological problems reported in the AUCCCD's study? I think it's possible. Computers, cell phones and iPods are the staples of any college student's everyday technological use. We use computers to log onto Facebook, cell phones to text our friends and iPods to listen to music. However, if our comfort is so deeply connected with something inanimate and fallible, we are continuously sacrificing real-life intimacy. The social isolation and disconnectedness that comes from the overuse of technology may be contributing to the college students' mental health problems.

Allowing boredom to take hold instead of spending hours on the Internet will help reduce the anxiety many Internet addicts have reported feeling. Realizing that our phones are not appendages, that they can be turned off for a few hours, will also ease our obsessive use. While these mental health issues require clinical observation, unplugging for a few hours and reconnecting through face-to-face conversations may help rehabilitate the waning emotional health of college students.