Potential Social Web Sites Addiction Motives among University Students

Abstract

Social websites are excessively used today among university students. Many students use it for different reasons which put them at risk for social websites addiction. The purpose of the study was to assess the potential social websites addiction motives among university students. Design: A descriptive correlational research design was utilized. The setting was first-year students at the faculty of art and faculty of nursing. Sample: A purposive sample of 140 students was selected from the above mention setting who have scores of 50 to 79 on social networking sites addiction scale (high-risk groups).Two instruments were used for data collection: instrument one contained an interview questionnaire composed of two parts about sociodemographic characteristics and social websites use data. Instrument two included two parts; part one was Internet use motives scale and part two included social networking addiction scale. The results revealed that the most common motives level were escaped from stress, social integration, and lack of assertiveness (77.14%, 72.86%, 64.28%, respectively).There was an increase in the mean score of sexual behavior as a motive for social websites use among males students than females students while there was an increase in the mean score of control as a motive for social websites use among females students than males students. There was a highly statistically significant positive correlation between potential social websites addiction and both of a lack of assertiveness, escape from stress and total motive for social websites use. It was concluded that the highest motives level for social websites use were escape from stress, social integration and a lack of assertiveness respectively. Thus, it was recommended that counseling program are needed to help the university students to control use social web sites and prevent falling into addiction