News

Internet addiction: genuine diagnosis or not?

As the use of technology has increased, a set of problematic psychological behaviors associated with internet use has evolved. This bibliometric research aims to discover and analyze internet addiction (IA) articles trends from 1996 to 2022.

This research is based on a bibliometric examination of internet addiction papers published between 1996 and 2022. The Scopus database was utilized to extract the needed documents, examine citation patterns and publication growth, and identify prolific authors and institutions.

There were 9692 publications on internet addiction from 1996 to 2022, with an average of 359 documents each year. A total of 21906 authors contributed to the literature, with the majority of publications (86.9%) being multi-authored. The United States (US) ranked first in terms of volume of publications (18.8%, n = 1819), followed by China (12.3%, n = 1194), the United Kingdom (8.3%, n = 808), and Turkey (6.2%, n = 602). However, the majority of the productive institutions were located in East Asia.

There is a substantial body of literature on internet addiction, with numerous worldwide collaborations. As IA will be a lingering problem with the increased digitization of all sectors, future research should focus on emerging topics such as social media and gaming addiction. Internet addiction among adolescents in particular is a key research area.

This article describes the construct of “behavioral addiction” and its place within addiction nosology. To accomplish this goal, we will begin by considering the idea of addiction in general (e.g., the etiology and epidemiology of the disorder), and we will use the addiction syndrome model to guide this discussion (Shaffer et al., 2004, 2012a,b). The syndrome model will focus and guide our consideration of a shared etiology of substance and behavior-based addiction by examining the antecedents of addiction. This common etiology reveals that development of and treatment for addiction is non-specific (i.e., a treatment designed for one expression of addiction also works for another)—further suggesting that addiction is a syndrome,¹ with common causes and multiple expressions (e.g., behavioral and substance-related addiction).

Internet addiction among high school students is an emerging public health issue in China. The objective of this study was to investigate the association between internet addiction and quality of life, as well as the mediation effect of social support in such an association, among Chinese rural high school students. A total of 1277 high school students (mean age: 17.35 years; standard deviation: 1.39 years) from three rural high schools in the province of Henan in China were recruited. Internet addiction was measured by the Young’s Internet Addiction Scale, quality of life was assessed with a 16-item Quality of Life Questionnaire, and social support was evaluated by the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support. This study revealed that the prevalence rate of internet addiction was 11.51% among the participants. Internet addiction was negatively associated with overall quality of life (β = -0.06, p < 0.001) and its four dimensions (mental β = -0.09, p < 0.001, physical β = -0.09, p < 0.001, social β = -0.05, p = 0.04, and cultural β = -0.060, p = 0.012). The study also confirmed that social support from families, friends, and significant others mediates the negative association between internet indication and quality of life.

Due to a growing need for the assessment of excessive Internet use and its potentially adverse effects, many Internet addiction assessment instruments have been developed. The aim of the present study was to analyse the factorial structure and psychometric properties of the Croatian version of one of the most commonly used instruments in this area, the Compulsive Internet Use Scale (CIUS). Data was collected in Croatia as part of the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD) in 2015 with students turning 16 years in the year of data collection (n = 2558). To evaluate the factorial structure of the CIUS, four models were tested using confirmatory factor analysis. A one-factor model with five correlated errors demonstrated overall best fit. The Croatian version of the 14-item CIUS demonstrated high internal consistency. There was a statistically significant and positive correlation between the CIUS and Internet use time, and a higher score on the CIUS was correlated with higher self-perceived problems related to social media use and gaming. This study demonstrated that the Croatian version of the CIUS offers high construct validity and reliability and can be adequately used in assessing unspecific compulsive Internet use among adolescents. Additionally, results support the use of shortened forms of the CIUS.

Internet addiction(IA) is now very common. However, few studies have explored the sex differences in risk factors for IA, especially among Chinese college students. This study aimed to investigate the sex differences in prevalence, risk factors and clinical correlates of IA among Chinese college students.

A total of 8098 college students from Hunan province were recruited using a cross-sectional design and a convenience sampling method. Each student filled out the survey online anonymously, which collected their information on their socio-demographics, internet addiction(Revised Chinese internet addiction scale;CIAS-R), ADHD(Wender Utah Rating Scale and World Health Organization (WHO) Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale v 1.1 Symptom Checklist), depression(Self-reporting Depression Scale;SDS), insomnia(Athens Insomnia Scale;AIS), anxiety(Self-Rating Anxiety Scale;SAS) and suicidal behaviors through WeChat.

Overall, the prevalence of IA in males and females was 7.21%(259/3592) and 8.17%(368/4506), respectively. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that suicidal ideation[odds ratio (OR),1.557;95% confidence interval (CI),1.083-2.240], suicide attempts(OR,2.081;95%CI:1.271-3.409), ADHD(OR,6.487;95%CI,4.697-8.959) and insomnia(OR,2.596;95%CI,1.910-3.529) were independent risk factors for male IA after controlling for confounding variables. Nationality(OR,1.507;95%CI,1.058-2.145), suicidal ideation(OR,2.012;95%CI,1.532-2.641), depression(OR,1.771;95%CI:1.071-2.930), ADHD(OR,4.497; 95%CI,3.285-6.158) and insomnia(OR,2.356;95%CI,1.813-3.061) were independent risk factors for female IA.

No causal relationships could be drawn due to the cross-sectional design.

This study shows IA is common among both sexes. IA is significantly associated with ADHD, insomnia and suicidal behaviors in both male and female students, indicating the importance of screening IA and addressing ADHD, insomnia and suicidal behaviors to improve the mental health of college students and better prevent suicide in both sexes.

While there is a growing number of studies investigating the determinants of social media addiction, there is a lack of research on examining the importance of such predictors and their inter-correlations and inter-dependences from psychotherapists’ and researchers’ point of views. Hence, utilizing the “Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL)” technique, the current study investigated the clinical importance of social media addiction from the perspective of researchers and psychotherapists. Accordingly, by reviewing the literature 15 distal predictors of social media addiction were extracted and further classified into three groups of personality factors, comorbid symptoms, and psychosocial factors. From the data collected from 35 respondents, the results highlighted the group of personality factors as the most important dimension increasing the risk for developing social media addiction from the respondents’ perspective. Moreover, the DEMATEL results revealed the predictors of openness to experience (personality dimension), loneliness (psychosocial), and depression (comorbid) as the most important predictors of social media addiction within each group. The results and implications of the study are discussed.