Associations of Smartphone Addiction, Chronotype, Sleep Quality, and Risk Of Eating Disorders Among University Students: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

Purpose With smartphone addiction’s (SA) increasing prevalence among young adults, there is a growing concern about its adverse effects on distorted dietary and lifestyle behaviors, including disturbed sleeping and eating patterns. We aim to study the prevalence of SA risk, poor sleeping quality, evening chronotype, and eating disorders (ED) risk among university students in the UAE. We also aim to assess the associations between them, emphasizing the one between ED and SA risks. Methods In this cross-sectional study, a self-administered online questionnaire was disseminated using the convenience sampling technique. Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire, Eating Attitude Test-26 items, and Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version were used to measure sleep quality, chronotype, ED risk, and SA risk, respectively. Descriptive and analytical statistics were applied, and P< 0.05 was considered for statistical significance. Results Out of 552 students (mean age: 21.2±5.1 years), 71% had poor sleep quality, 33.9% reported evening chronotype, 37.9% had ED risk, and 56.2% had SA risk. The risk of SA was significantly associated with both poor sleep quality (OR=2.93; 95% CI: 2.01-4.29; p<0.001) and evening chronotype (p=0.005). ED risk was significantly associated with poor sleep quality (p<0.001), but not with chronotype or SA risk. Poor sleep quality predicted best ED risk. Conclusion High prevalence of SA, ED risk, and poor sleep quality was reported among university students in the UAE. Associations between poor sleep quality, evening chronotype, SA risk, and ED risk were further confirmed, along with sleep quality predicting risks of ED.

Assessment of psychological distress among undergraduate Al Qadisiyah University Students

“…According to (Table 1) the results show statistical distribution of study sample by their socio-demographic data, it explains that the highest percentage of the students' subgroup are (Age ,Gender, Residence , Marital status , Monthly income, Family number ,Specialty, college , stage of college ,BMI ). Throughout the course of the data analysis of the current research, the results appear the highest percentage of the age students' subgroup are : students with ages between (18-22) years old with (72.6 %) the reason is that most college students often ranged (18)(19)(20)(21)(22) and this difference was due to the study community. this result agree with previous study that performed by ( 10) where the ages of the students ranged between 18-22 years and the percentage for them was (79.3%).…”

“…The studied samples included 380 student from al qadesiyah university. The statistical distribution of study sample by their socio-demographic data, it explains that the highest percentage of the students' subgroup are: students with ages between (18)(19)(20)(21)(22) years old (72.6 %), female students (55.3 %) ; those living in urban areas (75 %), and those who are single (81.1 %), those with roughly sufficient monthly income (41.6 %), those living with (2-8) family member (73.9), those who are studying in pure science specialty was (48.2 %) , those who are studying in science college (18.2).…”

“…Regarding age, the category (18)(19)(20)(21)(22) years recorded the highest GHQ-28 score (MS= 2.33); female student had psychological distress higher than male (2.37 and 2.21 respectively); students with insufficient monthly income showed higher psychological distress (MS=2.40); the humanitarian colleges exhibited the highest psychological distress score (MS=2.36) comparing the other specialties; College of Education for girls recorded the highest psychological distress score (MS=2.52) in comparison to the other colleges included in the study.…”

“…The General health questionnaire scale (GHQ-28 item) was used, which includes four aspects, which are as follows (anxiety domain , depression domain ,social domain, and the somatic domain ), which is a four-sided Likret Scale by ( 8) Arabic version adopted by ( 9) All items of level psychological distress questions has four responses, items No. (1,15,17,18,19,20,21) are as follows (more than usual,. The scoring were 4 points, Rather more than usual 3score ,No more than usual 2 score , Not at all 1 score).…”

“…The data was collected through the utilization of the developed questionnaire and by means of self-administrated questionnaire with the subjects' who were included in the present study, before data collection the investigator met the students at the classrooms to clarify the study subjects' and get their verbal agreement to participate in the study with right refuse or withdrawal in participation and confidential the information , then a copy of the questionnaire was distributed for each sample to completely. A total of 380 questionnaires for statistical analysis were collected from undergraduate university students, this process was applied at each college that was included in the present study, the data collection process has been performed from 29 December 2021 until 15 Feb 2022.…”