Compulsive internet use in adults: A study of prevalence and drivers within the current economic climate in the UK

Abstract

Compulsive Internet Use (CIU) refers to a maladaptive relationship with the tool, including a loss of control over the use, the use for mood change and withdrawal symptoms. Most studies have relied on student samples, thus little is known about its prevalence in adults. The first objective of this study was to examine CIU in adults that were either employed (N=260) or unemployed within the last year (N=256). Second, the drivers of CIU were examined, with a focus on attitudes that reflected the reality of long working hours and job insecurity that people experience in current workplaces. A high risk of CIU (63%) with no significant differences between employed and unemployed individuals was found. However, unemployed individuals were in the highest band of Internet use, a risk factor for CIU.Interestingly, unemployed 40-55 years old females experienced higher CIU than their male counterparts. Regarding drivers of CIU, the job attitudes working excessively and compulsively were the strongest predictors, beyond emotion stability. This was particularly true at high levels of social support. In view of this, organizations should proactively evaluate the risks associated with encouraging working excessively as ill-health consequences associated with CIU could outweigh the benefits.

Neuroscience of Internet Pornography Addiction: A Review and Update

“…Special attention to nomenclature was required here, as the disorder is studied under different headings. For example, in addition to the primary term of Internet Addiction, additional terms include “Compulsive Internet Use” [ 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 ], Internet Addiction Disorder [ 34 ], Internet Use Disorder [ 35 ], “Pathological Internet Use” [ 14 , 36 ], and “Problematic Internet Use” [ 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 ]. As such, the following search terms and their derivatives were used in multiple combinations: Addict*, compulsive, “compulsive internet”, cyber, Internet, “Internet use”, online, “pathological internet” and “problem* Internet” (to allow for problem and problematic).…”

Exploring the relationship between impulsivity and decision-making on mobile devices

“…This stress may not only affect how well work and life demands are managed, but also compromise security-related decision-making by affecting attention and deliberation of options. Further evidence to date suggests that workaholism tends to predict compulsive Internet use [51], which demonstrates how problematic the persistent and continuous use of communication technologies may become for balancing the demands of work and home life. Future research might explore the ways in which impulsive individuals self-regulate their behavior, so as to understand more precisely how they come to establish and maintain the barriers between home and work (as well the effect of distractors such as notifications and similar on maintaining boundaries).…”

Self-concept clarity, social support, and compulsive Internet use: A study of the US and the UAE

“…These vary considerably: 14.4% of German adults (Montag, Jurkiewicz, & Reuter, 2010), 30% of Japanese adults (Lu, Watanabe, Qingbo, Uji, Shono, Kitamura, 2011), 8.4% of young British adults (Charlton, 2002), and 61% of British adults (Quiñones-García & Korak-Kakabadse, 2014). Although the different tools to assess CIU converge in the conceptualization of the aforementioned dimensions, part of this variety may come from using different items in their chosen scale to assess the supposedly same dimension.…”

“…Since previous studies have analyzed the drivers of CIU in relation to overall CIU, which potentially mixed a range of engagement and core CIU dimensions (Caplan, 2003;Davis, 2001;Quiñones-García & Korak-Kakabadse, 2014), our second objective was to identify how individual differences wire people to be more vulnerable to this maladaptive use of the Internet, focusing on the core dimensions of the compulsive diagnostic tool. For this we built on Davis's (2001) model of diathesis and stress, according to which there need to be previous psychopathological issues (e.g.…”