The Association of Internet Addiction with Burnout, Depression, Insomnia, and Quality of Life among Hungarian High School Teachers

Abstract

The extensive availability of Internet has led to the recognition of problematic Internet use (so called Internet addiction, IA) mostly involving adolescents. There are limited data about the prevalence and consequences of IA in adults especially among high school teachers. Here, we present a cross-sectional prospective study focusing on the association of Internet addiction with burnout, depression, insomnia, and lower quality of life among high school teachers taking many co-variates into account. Overall, 623 males (34.3%) and 1194 females (65.7%) participated in our study. Internet addiction was detected in 5.2% (95/1817) based on the Problematic Internet Use Questionnaire. Internet addiction was associated with severe burnout (10.5 vs. 2.7%, p < 0.001), moderate (36.8 vs. 1.7%, p < 0.001), and severe (6.3 vs. 0.1%, p < 0.001) depression, insomnia (23.1 vs. 11.4%, p < 0.001), and severe sleep disturbance (severe insomnia, 27.4 vs. 3.8%, p < 0.001) and lower quality of life in all domains (p < 0.001). There was also a significant correlation of the severity of the above-mentioned parameters and the severity of IA (overall scores, p < 0.001 in all cases). In a multivariate analysis including demographic criteria, risk factors medical conditions and the above-mentioned parameters as co-variates internet addiction was significantly associated with depression (OR = 3.836, CI: 2.92–5.44, p = 0.03), and insomnia (OR: 3.932, CI: 3.6–5.69, p = 0.002). This is the first study from Hungary and is one of the first studies showing the association of IA with mental issues, burnout, and lower quality of life among adults. It underlines the clinical importance of problematic Internet use among adults.

Internet addiction in young adults: The role of impulsivity and codependency

“…This result is particularly relevant as it raises interesting questions about the potential extension of addiction problems into the fully adult age group. Some confirmation with respect to the age trend involved in such issues comes from studies that have recently focused on the Internet addiction of workers and professionals (108)(109)(110)(111). Other studies also point out the association between Internet addiction (in both adults and young adults) with depression (43,(112)(113)(114), hyperactivity and attention deficit (115)(116)(117)(118)(119).…”

“…Some confirmation with respect to the age trend involved in such issues comes from studies that have recently focused on the Internet addiction of workers and professionals ( 108 – 111 ). Other studies also point out the association between Internet addiction (in both adults and young adults) with depression ( 43 , 112 – 114 ), hyperactivity and attention deficit ( 115 – 119 ).…”

Prevalence and Risk Factors of Problematic Internet Use among Hungarian Adult Recreational Esports Players

“…As there are no clear diagnostic criteria for internet addiction, it is highly recommended that excessive internet use is measured with a continuous questionnaire [ 27 ]. We chose the Problematic Internet Use Questionnaire (PIUQ) because its structure tightly adheres to the proposed diagnostic criteria for internet addiction and was created based on clinimetric and psychometric analysis of Young’s Internet Addiction Test, independently validated by several groups and used in our previous published work [ 2 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 ]. The questionnaire contained 18 items, each scored on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (always).…”

Internet Use and Quality of Life: The Multiple Mediating Effects of Risk Perception and Internet Addiction

“…Literature [9] proposed four types of internet services: work, entertainment, social interaction, and family use. Recently, some studies had pay attention to the relationship between internet use and QoL as well as the relationship between internet addiction and QoL [10,11]. However, there is limited understanding of the internal influencing mechanism that different forms of internet use impact on people's QoL, and how this applies to the development of sustainable and healthy internet use practices that can help frame more valid institutional interventions benefitting the contemporary netizen and the digital human society.…”