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COVID-19 and technological addiction: The role of loneliness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

G. Rogier ,
S. Beomonte Zobel  and
P. Velotti
G. Rogier
Affiliation:
Dynamical And Clinical Psychology, Sapienza Università di Roma, Rome, Italy
S. Beomonte Zobel*
Affiliation:
Dynamical And Clinical Psychology, Sapienza Università di Roma, Rome, Italy
P. Velotti
Affiliation:
Dynamical And Clinical Psychology, Sapienza Università di Roma, Rome, Italy
*
*Corresponding author.

Abstract

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Introduction

The Covid-19 outbreak has shown to negatively impact on mental health. Several anecdotical and theoretical evidences argued that lockdown measures would have increased subjective feelings of loneliness and addictions’ proneness.

Objectives

In addition, preliminary data underlined a possible increase in the frequency of gaming and social media use. Increased loneliness levels are likely to account for increased gaming and social media addiction during the lockdown.

Methods

We conducted a longitudinal study administering to a sample of 154 Italian adults several self-report questionnaires at the beginning of lockdown (Time 1) and three days before the end of the lockdown (Time 2). We therefore assessed loneliness feelings, frequency of gaming and social media use as well as both gaming and social media addiction. Data were analysed using Structural Equation Modelling.

Results

We observed that loneliness levels longitudinally predicted both gaming and social media addiction also controlling for gaming and social media use at Time 1.

Conclusions

Increased feelings of loneliness, a well-known risk factor for gaming and social media addiction, may be a central variable heightening vulnerability to the onset or the maintenance of technological addiction during forced social isolation. Thus, future prevention interventions may want to target this issue.

Keywords

gaminglonelinesssocial network addictionCOVID-19 outbreak
Type
Abstract
Information
European Psychiatry , Volume 64 , Special Issue S1: Abstracts of the 29th European Congress of Psychiatry , April 2021 , pp. S560
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Psychiatric Association
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