Elsevier

Computers in Human Behavior

Volume 28, Issue 6, November 2012, Pages 2152-2159
Computers in Human Behavior

A model of the relationship between psychological characteristics, mobile phone addiction and use of mobile phones by Taiwanese university female students

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2012.06.020Get rights and content

Abstract

While many researches have analyzed the psychological antecedents of mobile phone addiction and mobile phone usage behavior, their relationship with psychological characteristics remains mixed. We investigated the relationship between psychological characteristics, mobile phone addiction and use of mobile phones for 269 Taiwanese female university students who were administered Rosenberg’s self-esteem scale, Lai’s personality inventory, and a mobile phone usage questionnaire and mobile phone addiction scale. The result showing that: (1) social extraversion and anxiety have positive effects on mobile phone addiction, and self-esteem has negative effects on mobile phone addiction. (2) Mobile phone addiction has a positive predictive effect on mobile phone usage behavior. The results of this study identify personal psychological characteristics of Taiwanese female university students which can significantly predict mobile phone addiction; female university students with mobile phone addiction will make more phone calls and send more text messages. These results are discussed and suggestions for future research for school and university students are provided.

Highlights

► The hypothesis model of this research is significantly related. ► The result support the daily calls and daily sent text messages as indicators for usage behavior. ► There is no relationship between social extroversion and mobile phone behavior.

Introduction

Mobile phones are spreading in popularity; young people, especially, increase their social communication frequency and expand their opportunities for making social relationships (Igarashi et al., 2005, Matsuda, 2000) using this technology. In contrast, mobile phone can also lead to many problems. For example, the use of mobile phones in schools reduces the concentration of the students during class (Hiscock, 2004, Selwyn, 2003), creates billing problems (Funston and MacNeill, 1999, Youth Action, 2004), leads to unsafe driving habits (Pennay, 2006, Walsh et al., 2008), and causes mobile phone addiction (Ehrenberg et al., 2008, Walsh and White, 2007). Of all of these outcomes, mobile phone addiction has the strongest relationships with mobile phone usage. Therefore, examining the psychological antecedents of and the relationships between mobile phone addiction and mobile phone usage for adolescents will enhance our understanding of the development mechanism for mobile phone addiction and mobile phone usage behavior.

Section snippets

Gender and mobile phone addiction

A theme of interest for many researchers relates to gender differences in mobile phone addiction. Although many researchers have addressed this topic, there is no agreement on which is the highest risk group for mobile phone addiction. However, women are more likely to be dependent on mobile phones (Billieux, Linden, & Rochat, 2008), and more likely to use mobile phones (Walsh, White, Cox, & Young, 2011). At the same time, internet research indicates that female university students prefer using

Design

The study incorporated a cross-sectional design with participants completing a paper-and-pencil self report survey. The outcome measure was mobile phone use behavior. The intervening variable was mobile phone addiction. The predictor variables were self-esteem, social extraversion and anxiety.

Participants

Participants were female undergraduate students from three universities in Taiwan selected using random sampling. Data collection was conducted over a six week period. A total of 400 questionnaires were

Descriptive statistics

This research found that female Taiwanese college students most frequently used mobile phone functions for voice-calling (a mean total of 144, accounting for 53.5%), sending text messages (m = 101, 37.5%), and its use as an alarm (m = 65, 24.2%). This result supports the use of the number of daily calls sent text messages as indicators for mobile phone usage behavior. Secondly, as shown in Table 2, respondents’ average daily mobile phone using time was 102.61 min (sd = 159.05), the average monthly

Discussion

This research provides important primary analyses to explain the process of female university students’ psychological antecedents influencing mobile phone usage behavior. By developing a mobile phone usage behavior model that can examine the psychological characteristics to predict mobile phone addiction and mobile phone usage behavior, we have analyzed the antecedents which influence female university students’ mobile phone communication styles. The results of this research not only improve on

Limitations

There are many limitations which can influence the result of this research. This study builds upon a research model based on psychological antecedents applied to predicting mobile phone addiction and mobile phone usage behavior. Participants in this research are Taiwanese female university students, which limits generalizability; future research will be needed to show if these tenets can be applied to male university students. Furthermore, while the examined levels of addiction of this research

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