Abstract
BackgroundInternet addiction among US college students remains a concern, but robust estimates of its prevalence are lacking.MethodsWe conducted a pilot survey of 307 college students at two US universities. Participants completed the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) as well as the Patient Health Questionnaire. Both are validated measures of problematic Internet usage and depression, respectively. We assessed the association between problematic Internet usage and moderate to severe depression using a modified Poisson regression approach. In addition, we examined the associations between individual items in the IAT and depression.ResultsA total of 224 eligible respondents completed the survey (73% response rate). Overall, 4% of students scored in the occasionally problematic or addicted range on the IAT, and 12% had moderate to severe depression. Endorsement of individual problematic usage items ranged from 1% to 70%. In the regression analysis, depressive symptoms were significantly associated with several individual items. Relative risk could not be estimated for three of the twenty items because of small cell sizes. Of the remaining 17 items, depressive symptoms were significantly associated with 13 of them, and three others had P values less than 0.10. There was also a significant association between problematic Internet usage overall and moderate to severe depression (relative risk 24.07, 95% confidence interval 3.95 to 146.69; P = 0.001).ConclusionThe prevalence of problematic Internet usage among US college students is a cause for concern, and potentially requires intervention and treatment amongst the most vulnerable groups. The prevalence reported in this study is lower than that which has been reported in other studies, however the at-risk population is very high and preventative measures are also recommended.
Highlights
Pathological use of the Internet, whether problematic or truly addictive, remains a growing concern worldwide [1]
4% of students scored in the occasional problem or addicted range on the Internet Addiction Test (IAT), and 12% had moderate to severe
Endorsement of individual problematic usage items ranged from 1% to 70% (Table 2)
Summary
Pathological use of the Internet, whether problematic or truly addictive, remains a growing concern worldwide [1]. Absent formal diagnostic criteria, current approaches model problematic Internet usage on the basis of problematic gambling, extrapolating data from one compulsive, nonpharmacologically addictive behavior to another. College students are a group that may be vulnerable to addiction, as they have largely unfettered, unsupervised access to the Internet and independent control of their time. Given that the Internet is woven into the fabric of the lives of this generation of children, concerns about the potential for addiction seem warranted and require a systematic estimation of the scope of the problem in a defined population of interest. Internet addiction among US college students remains a concern, but robust estimates of its prevalence are lacking
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