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Social networks are increasingly being linked with addiction and mental illness, and now a new study claims Twitter could even bring on episodes of psychosis.

In the study, researchers from Berlin presented the case of a 31-year-old woman who had been hospitalised after developing delusions, which were linked to her 'excessive' use of Twitter.

After studying how the social network influenced the patient's perception, the researchers proposed social media has the potential to 'aggravate or even induce psychotic symptoms'.

However, they were quick to note that Twitter, and social media in general, only has this effect on particularly vulnerable patients who are already predisposed to psychosis.

Researchers from Berlin presented the case of a 31-year-old 'Mrs C.', who had been hospitalised after developing delusions, which were linked to her 'excessive' use of Twitter. They proposed social media has the potential to 'to induce psychotic symptoms' - but only with vulnerable people already predisposed to psychosis

Lead researcher, Dr Jan Kalbitzer, physician at Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, told MailOnline that this study was published to raise the issue, and refers to an individual case study.

He continued that he's seen very few cases over the past years, and added: 'At this point you should not be worried about Twitter psychosis as a normal user.'

The woman referenced in the study was a 31-year-old dubbed 'Mrs C'.

She was hospitalised for intensive suicidal thoughts and compulsions, but had no previous history of psychiatric illness.

The symptoms began approximately eight months before she was hospitalised, and four months in, Mrs C's family reported she was using Twitter 'excessively.'

This was defined as 'several hours a day' and led to her 'neglecting relationships, meals and sleeping hours.'

She started suffering from delusions that a celebrity was talking to her, through hidden and symbolic messages in tweets - and that she had to react to these so-called 'tasks' the celebrity was giving her.

This symbols then began appearing in her offline world and she reported paranoid delusions that a sect, or organisation, were behind the tasks.

Dr Kalbitzer continued: 'The main problems at Twitter are the spam bots and the abbreviations.

'Due to the structure of Twitter, it is quite easy to program spam bots for it, and the use of abbreviations is promoted by the limitation to 140 characters.

'Furthermore, people on Twitter can have the impression that they are personally addressed because the spam bots get more active if they get more active.

'And, although we have no formal proof for that, we had the impression that the spam bots sometimes send tweets with confusing abbreviations in order to create curiosity to follow a link.

'Or in the case of our patients cause or add to the development of psychiatric symptoms.'

The researchers linked their findings to the combination of 'the amount of symbolic language, caused by the limitation of 140 characters per Twitter message, the automated spam responses with seemingly related content, and the general interactive features of Twitter'

'We wanted to spark a discussion about what Twitter does to our minds and chose a provocative title to bring this subject up.'

The article was published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease.

When asked if his team would be carrying out any follow-up research, Dr Kalbitzer said: 'Definitely. The fact that a single case study caused such a world-wide attention is a clear indicator that we know way too little about the effect of social media on mental health.'

However, researchers from the University of Louisville recently claimed social networks can help support people with mental illnesses, because they give people the opportunity to meet and connect with others going through the same thing.

'Through sharing pictures, videos and stories about their families' highs and lows support group members are able to get to know each other better and form a deeper connection with one another,' said the university.

Similarly, a study from the University of Missouri last year found that that social networks are useful tools to help diagnose a person's psychiatric condition, by studying how they behave on the sites.

Researchers in Milan also found social networks can spark a natural high leading to a relaxed heart rate and lower levels of stress and tension.