A Study on the Effects of Loneliness, Depression and Perceived Social Support on Problematic Internet Use among University Students

Abstract

The present study investigated the effects of loneliness, depression and perceived social support on problematic Internet use among university students. The participants were 459 students at two universities in Turkey. The study data were collected with a Questionnaire Form, Problematic Internet Use Scale (PIUS), University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) Loneliness Scale (Version 3), Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). The Mann-Whitney U Test and Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance were conducted to examine the differences; and correlation and regression analyses were used to examine the relationships between variables. There was a positive significant correlation between the PIUS and MSPSS and the UCLA Loneliness Scale and a negative significant correlation between the PIUS and Beck Depression Scale (BDS). The female students had higher total PIUS scores. The results also illustrated that there was a statistically significant difference in total PIUS scores according to having a social network account.