A conceptual and methodological critique of internet addiction research: Towards a model of compensatory internet use

Types of smartphone usage and relations with problematic smartphone behaviors: The role of content consumption vs. social smartphone use

“…One explanation is that people enjoy engaging in more process and social smartphone usage, and thus it does not feel like one's smartphone interferes with daily life. This finding also fits with CIUT in that people may compensate for negative emotion by engaging in process and/or social smartphone use, and such smartphone engagement may help alleviate negative mood (Kardefelt-Winther, 2014). In fact, people may feel as though greater process and social use (to an extent) helps them in daily life because of the productivity and time-saving features of a smartphone.…”

“…Traditional theoretical models have examined psychopathology predicting increased smartphone use frequency, which in turn predicts problematic smartphone use Kim, Seo, & David, 2015;van Deursen et al, 2015). This model assumes that psychopathology lends itself to increase smartphone use, which in turn can grow into problematic use, a notion that fits with UGT (Blumler, 1979) and CIUT (Kardefelt-Winther, 2014). However, such models have rarely measured smartphone use frequency or problematic use in a multidimensional manner (using subscales), and future work could benefit from such a richer multidimensional approach.…”

“…Applying UGT within the context of problem smartphone use, individuals' problem smartphone behaviors may vary as a function of the particular types of smartphone uses they prefer (Park et al, 2013). Kardefelt-Winther's (2014) recently-developed Compensatory Internet Use Theory (CIUT) could be viewed as an extension of UGT, in explaining variables that drive such use. Specifically, this theory attempts to understand the negative life events and stressors that motivate some people to use (or overuse) technology in order to alleviate negative emotion about such stressors.…”

MMORPG gaming and hostility predict Internet Addiction symptoms in adolescents: An empirical multilevel longitudinal study

“…This interpretation supports the notion that the Internet is used to compensate for offline challenges (Kardefelt-Winther, 2014).…”

Who gets hooked on Facebook? An exploratory typology of problematic Facebook users

“…Based on the model of compensatory internet use (Kardefelt-Winther, 2014), outcome expectancy theory (Jones et al, 2001), and the findings from this study, we propose that there are at least four potential pathways to problematic Facebook use: online social enhancement, social monitoring, procrastination, and entertainment. These pathways are now explored in more detail.…”