[A study of factors that influence Internet addiction, smoking, and drinking in high school students]

This study aimed at exploring relationships among Internet addiction, smoking, and drinking and examining the effect factors on Internet addiction, smoking and drinking.

By using stratified sampling, 1,529 participants representing high school students in the Kangwon province were selected. Data was analyzed by SPSS 12.0. using chi2, Pearson correlation coefficient and multiple regression.

One-fifth of the total participants were at the mild or moderate stage of Internet addiction. Regarding smoking, 22.7% of male subjects and 4.5% of female subjects were current smokers. Regarding drinking, the percentages of subjects who drank alcohol once or twice per month were 53.5% of male students and 40.7% of female students. Internet addiction positively correlated with depression, novelty seeking, harm avoidance and reward dependence, Internet addiction negatively correlated with persistence, self-directness, cooperativeness, and self-transcendence. Significant factors affecting Internet addiction were depression, gender, novelty seeking, and self-transcendence. Important factors influencing smoking were drinking, gender, school type, satisfaction with school, novelty seeking, and reward dependence. Significant factors affecting drinking were smoking, novelty seeking, school type and ages.

This study shows the necessity of developing and implementing effective intervention programs in order to prevent adolescents from experiencing Internet addiction and health risk behaviors.