Internet Addiction in High School Students in Turkey and Multivariate Analyses of the Underlying Factors

Abstract

The aim of this study is to examine the Internet addiction among adolescents in relation to their sociodemographic characteristics, communication skills, and perceived familial social support. This cross-sectional research is conducted in the high schools in some city centers, in Turkey, in 2013. In this study, cluster sampling was used. In each school, a class for each grade level was randomly selected, and all the students in the selected classes were included in the sample. One thousand seven hundred forty-two students aged between 14 and 20 years were included in the sample.The mean Internet Addiction Scale (IAS) score of the students was found to be 27.9 ± 21.2. According to the scores obtained from IAS, 81.8% of the students were found to display no symptoms (<50 points), 16.9% were found to display borderline symptoms (50-79 points), and 1.3% were found to be Internet addicts (≥80 points). According to the results of the binary logistic regression, male students and the students in single sex vocational schools were found to report higher levels of borderline Internet addiction. It was also observed that the IAS score increases when the father's educational level increases and when the students' school performance is worse. On the other hand, the IAS score decreases when the student grade level, perceived family social support, and communication skills scores increase.The risk factors for Internet addiction are being a male, low academic achievement, inadequate social support and communication skills, and father's high educational level.

Problematic internet use among high school students: Prevalence, associated factors and gender differences

“…Better coping mechanisms and greater resilience in late adolescence could explain the lower risk behaviour with age among the females (Amaro et al, 2001;Hess and Richards, 1999). Our observation of a higher risk of PIU for vocational school students than for those attending a lyceum is similar to what observed in the Italian study by Poli (Poli and Agrimi, 2012), and in other studies (Kilic et al, 2016;Yen et al, 2008). In Italy, vocational school students generally come from families with a low socio-economic status, a characteristic that has been associated with higher PIU risk ( Yen et al, 2007Yen et al, , 2008Zhang et al, 2016).…”

Internet addiction among medical students of Sohag University, Egypt

“…This is in agreement with our results that highlights the significant association between poor family relationships and increased risk of IA (OR=1.9; 95% CI: 2.2-3.9). Correspondingly, Kilic et al [17] indicated that IA was uncommon among those having good family relations and enjoying family support.…”

“…Our findings are also consistent with the results of two studies in India, which reported that 46.8% and 44.6% of the respondents had IA of whom 0.5 and 3.07% were severe IAs, respectively [23,24] . Several studies in Iran, Turkey, and Tunisia found that 16.9, 18.8, and 28.7% of the respondents had IA [3,17,25] .…”

“…Several previous studies [14][15][16][17] suggested that IA is an important public health problem among adolescents and young adults. This study was conducted to investigate the prevalence of IA in medical students in Sohag and its associated risk factors.…”

Adicción a internet en adolescentes: una breve revisión

“…Hoy en día los adolescentes están más involucrados, en comparación con los adultos, por ejemplo, en el uso de internet (Blinka et al, 2014;Kilic, Avci, & Uzuncakmak, 2016). Además, la evidencia disponible refiere que los adolescentes son más propensos a la AI como una forma de mantener y/o aumentar su círculo social (Smahel et al, 2012); en ese sentido, serían el grupo etario con mayor acceso a internet (Kuss, Griffiths, Karila, & Billieux, 2014).…”