The news of the experiment provoked a storm of protest from legal rights groups but it has provided a hot topic for comedy shows too. However, other universities and secondary schools are watching the result of the week of abstinence very closely since young Americans have become addicted to using Facebook and Twitter, which hinders their ability to concentrate and has unforeseeable and adverse effects upon their studies.   

Some 77 percent of Americans (230 million people) use the Internet and 150 million have signed up to Facebook. According to the most recent data, the use of Facebook has overtaken that of Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and AOL. At present an average American spends over seven hours per month on social networking sites but this figure is increasing from month to month. Taking into consideration that only fifty percent are active users, proportionately more time is spent on these sites by young people, who tend to be the active users. Leaders of universities and secondary schools have been shocked by the data. 

This is not the first study that has been conducted on the effect social media has on young people and especially university students. In 2010 research was done in Maryland University to see what happens when people are deprived of all their social media tools for a day.

The results showed that by the end of the day the subjects were demonstrating the same symptoms as those seen in the cases of drug and alcohol withdrawal: they felt depressed, and levels of stress and anxiety grew significantly. They claimed that they did not feel safe to face the world without their mobile telephones and laptops and they felt they had become isolated and deprived of family and friends.

They also reported that they had a constant urge to send a text message and to check their Facebook. Although young people are interested in world events, they are not attached to one single source for news and prefer to inform themselves from their friends and from Facebook. They can imagine their lives without televisions or newspapers but not without their computers, mobile phones or iPods.

The one-week break from Facebook and Twitter at the University of Pennsylvania that began on Monday is not intended as punishment or censorship but rather seeks to initiate a healthy debate on an important social issue, i.e. how social media can be used effectively, what a responsible adult society can do for young people and how a balance can be struck between online and offline life.    

Some of the Pennsylvania students protested and gave full vent to their online passion after lessons outside their campus. However, the majority of them did not revolt. They recognise their media addiction and feel that without specialist help they would be incapable of freeing themselves from it in order to concentrate on their studies. Depending upon the results of the experiment several other educational institutions are considering taking similar steps, as they say, "in the students' interests".