Home > Excessive and pathological Internet use - risk-behavior or psychopathology?

Kaess, Michael and Klar, Johanna and Kindler, Jochen and Parzer, Peter and Brunner, Romuald and Carli, Vladimir and Sarchiapone, Marco and Hoven, Christina W and Apter, Alan and Balazs, Judit and Barzilay, Shira and Bobes, Julio and Cozman, Doina and Gomboc, Vanja and Haring, Christian and Kahn, Jean-Pierre and Keeley, Helen and Meszaros, Gergely and Musa, George J and Postuvan, Vita and Saiz, Pilar and Sisask, Merike and Varnik, Peeter and Resch, Franz and Wasserman, Danuta (2021) Excessive and pathological Internet use - risk-behavior or psychopathology? Addictive Behaviors, 123, p. 107045. doi: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2021.107045.

External website: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/...

Pathological Internet use (but only with respect to gaming) is classified as mental disorder in the ICD-11. However, there is a large group of adolescents showing excessive Internet use, which may rather be considered adolescent risk-behavior. The aim was to test whether pathological and excessive Internet use should be considered as "psychopathology" or "risk-behavior". A representative, cross-sectional sample of 11.110 students from 10 European Union countries was analyzed. Structural equation models, including the factors "risk-behavior" and "psychopathology" and the variables excessive and pathological Internet use, were tested against each other. "Risk-behavior" was operationalized by several risk-behaviors (e.g. drug abuse, truancy, etc). "Psychopathology" included measures of several mental disorders (e.g. depression, hyperactivity, etc). Excessive Internet use was assessed as the duration and frequency of Internet use. Pathological Internet use was assessed with the Young Diagnostic Questionnaire (i.e., presence of addiction criteria). Excessive Internet use loaded on "risk-behavior" (λ = 0.484, p < .001) and on "psychopathology" (λ = 0.071, p < .007). Pathological Internet use loaded on "risk-behavior" (λ = 0.333, p < .001) and on "psychopathology" (λ = 0.852, p < .001). Chi-square tests determined that the loadings of excessive Internet use (χ (1) = 81.98, p < .001) were significantly stronger on "risk-behavior" than "psychopathology". Vice versa, pathological Internet use loaded significantly stronger on "psychopathology" (χ (1) = 107.10, p < .001). The results indicate that pathological Internet use should rather be considered as psychopathology. Excessive Internet use on the other hand, should be classified as adolescent risk-behavior.


Item Type
Article
Publication Type
Irish-related, International, Open Access, Article
Drug Type
Behavioural addiction
Intervention Type
Screening / Assessment
Date
2021
Identification #
doi: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2021.107045
Page Range
p. 107045
Publisher
Elsevier Science
Volume
123
EndNote

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