Comparison of Students With and Without Problematic Smartphone Use in Light of Attachment Style

Abstract

Background: Nowadays, media addictions are especially of high relevance to psychotherapeutic practice. More recently, this particularly includes excessive smartphone usage. Even though a growing number of scientific literature and also mainstream media highlight problematic smartphone use as a serious health problem, there is only little research on this issue. Objective: The aim of this study was to examine this phenomenon with a focus on attachment-specific differences between students with and without problematic smartphone use. Method: A survey was carried out on all enrolled students of the Sigmund Freud University Vienna. The Smartphone Addiction Scale (SPAS) was used to differentiate between students with and without problematic smartphone use. The attachment style was assessed using the Bielefeld Partnership Expectations Questionnaire (BFPE). Results: Of the total sample, 75 of the students (15.1%) showed a problematic smartphone use. A positive correlation between excessive smartphone usage and an insecure attachment style was found. Discussion: Therapy for problematic smartphone use should be carried out in light of patient’s attachment style. Further research into other factors of mental stress and personality is needed to better understand problematic smartphone use.

Excessive Smartphone Use Is Associated With Health Problems in Adolescents and Young Adults

“…Insecure attachment positively correlated with problematic smartphone use in students with unhealthy family function but not with mother-infant bonding or maternal mental health (16). Eichenberg et al (17) showed an association between excessive smartphone use and an insecure attachment style in Problematic adolescent users. A following study reported high scores in maladaptive Cognitive-emotion regulation (CER) strategies such as self-blame, blaming of others ruminating and catastrophizing thoughts (18).…”

Smartphone Use, Experience of Learning Environment, and Academic Performance among University Students: A Descriptive Appraisal

“…In the context of higher learning, the use of smartphones among students has been an area of interest. Most previous studies have generally focused on smartphone addiction and its influence on students' quality of life [2][3][4]. Within this research area, scholarly studies have also been dedicated to examining the association between smartphone use and academic performance [5][6][7][8][9][10].…”

Emotional intelligence and adult attachment: effects on problematic smartphone usage

“…Although there is some debate in the literature about the consideration of the problematic smartphone usage as an addiction disorder, in this research the term "problematic usage" is used given that it has not been recognized in the DSM-V (for more detail see Panova & Carbonell, 2018). For this reason, most investigations focus on describing behaviours and diagnostic criteria, whereas the factors underlying problematic smartphone usage, beyond self-esteem and introversion-extraversion, are largely unknown (Eichenberg et al, 2019;Haverlag, 2013). To clarify high risk factors for problematic smartphone usage, an indepth investigation was performed in order to analyse the role of two relevant self-regulation mechanisms that have a major impact on how a person interacts with his/her environment: emotional intelligence and attachment system.…”