Discriminating power of socio-demographic and psychological variables on addictive use of cellular phones among middle school students

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to examine the degrees of cellular phone usage among middle school students and to identify discriminating factors of addictive use of cellular phones among sociodemographic and psychological variables. METHODS: From 123 middle schools in Busan, potential participants were identified through stratified random sampling and 747 middle school students participated in the study. The data was collected from December 1, 2004 to December 30, 2004. Descriptive and discriminant analyses were used. RESULTS: Fifty seven percent of the participants were male and 89.7% used cellular phones at school. The participants were grouped into three groups depending on the levels of the cellular phone usage: addicted (n=117), dependent (n=418), non-addicted (n=212). Within the three groups, two functions were produced and only one function was significant, discriminating the addiction group from non-addiction group. Additional discriminant analysis with only two groups produced one function that classified 81.2% of the participants correctly into the two groups. Impulsiveness, anxiety, and stress were significant discriminating factors. CONCLUSION: Based on the findings of this study, developing intervention programs focusing on impulsiveness, anxiety and stress to reduce the possible addictive use of cellular phones is suggested.