We report the case of a 19-year-old female adolescent with social anxiety who has watched television for 8 to 14 hours daily, sometimes 20 hours, over the past 4-5 years. We discuss the patient's subjective perceptions of this situation; the cluster of symptoms she experienced when she tried to change this behavior for the first time; the short-term prognosis after administration of sertraline 200 mg/d, analytic psychotherapy and cognitive approach during psychiatric outpatient treatment. A possible "television addiction," or perhaps more appropriately, a "harmful use" of television is discussed (such diagnosis is not included in psychiatric nosographic classifications).
Television; compulsive behavior; anxiety disorders; adolescent