Association between attitudes towards Internet usage and health practices in high-school students in 2 schools in Turkey: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Excessive usage of the Internet can negatively affect health and health practices especially among youth. To examine the issue among Turkish students, this study determined the association between high-school students' attitudes towards Internet usage and their health behaviour. The sample (n = 2043) was randomly drawn from all students at two high schools in Turkey: one in Anatolia and one (a vocational school) in Istanbul. Data were collected using the Structured Questionnaire, Attitude Scale towards Internet Usage (ASTIU) and Adolescent Lifestyle Profile (ALP). The mean age of the students was 16.3 years, 77.7% were male and 96.9% used the Internet; mean duration of Internet use was 18.8 h/week. Female students had more positive attitudes towards Internet usage. Mean scores for ASTIU and ALP were 72.58 (SD 17.64) and 111.34 (SD 16.61) respectively, which were average levels. There was a statistically significant but weak overall negative correlation between adolescents' attitudes towards Internet usage and their health behaviour. Our results concur with studies in different cultures which suggest some negative effects, of heavy Internet use.

Internet Usage and Its Addiction Level among Students in a Selected College in Ras Al Khaimah Emirate: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…whose participant's states that they feel happy and comfortable when they use the internet and that they support the use of the internet being the latest invention in this information era, they however few feel that they lose their feelings of time while using the internet. The result of this study reveals that there is a positive correlation between attitude score of internet usage and the age of the study group with no statistically significant difference, this agrees with Özmutaf, Özgür, & Gökmen, 2008;Kaya, N. (2016) that indicated the participant's attitudes toward computer and internet usage were significantly related to age, the youngest participants are less than 30 years old significantly scored higher than the participants in the older groups of age more than 40. In general internet and computer usage decrease by increasing age.…”

“…This was in agreement with the findings of Chacko et al, (2015). Accordingly, there has been a well-documented increase in installing internet facilities in homes, offices, places of learning, in specialist businesses, such as internet cafes and computer game shops in the Emirates (Özmutaf, Özgür, & Gökmen, 2008;Kaya, N. 2016).…”

The effect of undergraduate nursing students’ e-Health literacy on healthy lifestyle behaviour

“…and the Internet usage of the students (questions they can answer as yes or no, such as 'following the developments in the field of health on the internet' or 'searching for health information on the internet last week', etc.) (3,4,6).…”

“…e-Health literacy provides coordinated use of information and technology at any level (2). All scientific areas, including healthcare, have been affected by the rapid development of information and communication technology such as the Internet and mobile technology usage (3)(4)(5).…”

High School Girls and Smartphone Applications to Track Menstrual Cycle

“…It is also possible that information on online platforms influenced their decision to use menstrual cycle tracking apps, given that adolescents spend several hours daily browsing the Internet and up to 81% of teenagers report search for health-related information online (20). Worldwide, adolescent girls frequent the Internet in search of health information more commonly than boys (21,22). Because adolescents are commonly being referred to as the "digital natives" (23), they frequently access various online platforms in search of health-related information.…”