Development of the Smartphone Addiction Risk Rating Score for a Smartphone Addiction Management Application

Effectiveness of brief mindfulness intervention for college students' problematic smartphone use: The mediating role of self-control

BACKGROUND

Mainland China has the most smartphone users worldwide, especially among college students, while mindfulness intervention can significantly alleviate the level of problematic smartphone use. We examined the effects of a brief mindfulness intervention on problematic smartphone use and investigated if this effect is mediated by self-control.

METHODS

Participants were recruited randomly from a university in Beijing of China. Forty-four college students were assigned to a mindfulness group or a control group. The mindfulness group took part in a brief (30 min) single-session mindfulness intervention. The control group was instructed to listen to a neutral news audio recording for the same duration (30 min). The Freiburg Mindfulness Inventory, Mobile Phone Addiction Tendency Scale, and Self-control Scale were used to measure state mindfulness, problematic smartphone use, and self-control of college students at pre-intervention and post-intervention, respectively.

RESULTS

Two-way repeated-measures ANOVA revealed that the mindfulness group had significant improvements in state mindfulness (p = .049) and self-control (p = .012), and had significant alleviation in problematic smartphone use (p < .001) at post-intervention. In the regression model, self-control had a mediating effect between mindfulness intervention and problematic smartphone use (95% CI [0.490, 7.216]).

CONCLUSIONS

A brief single-session mindfulness intervention can alleviate the level of problematic smartphone use and increase the level of state mindfulness and self-control compared to the control group. Self-control can completely mediate the efficacy of the mindfulness intervention in reducing problematic smartphone use.

Predictors of Habitual and Addictive Smartphone Behavior in Problematic Smartphone Use

OBJECTIVE

Smartphones have become common, and problematic smartphone use (PSU) is increasing. Predictors of PSU should be identified to prevent it. Little is known about the role of content types of smartphone use as predictors of PSU. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate the predictors of two proposed concepts of PSU, namely habitual smartphone behavior (SB) and addictive SB, within the context of the application (app) categories.

METHODS

We studied 1,039 smartphone users using online surveys conducted between January 2 and 31, 2019. We employed multiple regression analysis to identify the predictors of habitual and addictive SB. We controlled for sex and age (mean=39.20).

RESULTS

Common predictors of habitual and addictive SB were the use of social networking services, games, entertainment apps, and average weekend smartphone usage time. The predictors of habitual SB were the use of web and lifestyle apps, weekly usage frequency, and sex (female) and the predictors of addictive SB were the use of shopping apps and sleep duration.

CONCLUSION

This study revealed the need to consider habitual and addictive SB in evaluating PSU. The predictors in terms of the content types of smartphone usage can be used to develop monitoring and prevention services for PSU.