Correlates of problematic internet use among undergraduate medical students of Delhi

Deepak Dhamnetiya,Ravi Prakash Jha,Satyavir Singh

doi:10.1186/s12888-021-03529-z

Deepak Dhamnetiya, Ravi Prakash Jha + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-021-03529-z

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Journal: BMC Psychiatry	Publication Date: Oct 15, 2021
Citations: 5	License type: open-access

Affiliation: Maulana Azad Medical College

Abstract

BackgroundGlobally, due to population diversity, the prevalence of problematic internet use (PIU) varies from 7.3 to 51%. This study aims to assess correlates of problematic internet use among undergraduate medical students of Delhi and derive a model for allocating new subjects among categories of internet users.Material and methodsA cross-sectional study was conducted on 201 medical-undergraduate students in a medical college of Delhi from April 1st to May 31st, 2019. A semi-structured and pre-tested questionnaire was used to collect demographic information and factors affecting PIU. Dr. Kimberly Young’s Internet Addiction Test (IAT) tool was used to assess PIU. Binary logistic regression has been applied to assess the correlates of PIU, and step-wise discriminant analysis (DA) has been applied to derive a model for allocation of new subjects among categories of internet users. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (Trial version 27.0; SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL) software was used for statistical analysis.ResultTotal 41.3% of the subjects had PIU. Univariate analysis shows that internet use for emotional support, watching adult content, and gambling were significantly associated with PIU; however, in binary logistic regression, chatting, emotional support and watching online adult content were significant risk factors for PIU. The discriminant model correctly classified 66.2% of respondents into average and problematic internet user groups.ConclusionWe should create awareness among medical students regarding problematic internet use and its potential harms; this could be included in the foundation course of curriculum implementation support program (CISP) for MBBS students.

Highlights

Due to population diversity, the prevalence of problematic internet use (PIU) varies from 7.3 to 51%
We should create awareness among medical students regarding problematic internet use and its potential harms; this could be included in the foundation course of curriculum implementation support program (CISP) for MBBS students
We have found no association of PIU with a preferred time of internet use; this has been corroborated with a study conducted by Salehi et al [6]; whereas Gedam et al [3] found PIU was significantly higher in students whose preferred time of internet access was evening or night vis-a-vis morning or afternoon

Summary

Introduction

Due to population diversity, the prevalence of problematic internet use (PIU) varies from 7.3 to 51%. Researchers found that 73% of college students accessed the internet at least once a day and spent approximately 1.6 to 4.5 h a day online, preferably during the night [2,3,4,5]. Due to population diversity, different instruments, cut-off scores used, and different sample characteristics, the prevalence of problematic internet use (PIU) vary from 7.3 to 51% [6,7,8,9,10,11]; whereas, In India, it ranges from 7.45 to 19.85% among undergraduate medical students [2, 3, 12, 13].

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