Impact of Technology Addiction among School Going Adolescents – An Observational Study

Abstract

Adolescents have been labelled the "digital natives of the technology age", yet evaluating adolescents' understanding, attitudes, and behaviour with respect to technology addiction (TA) Internet use, instant messaging, online gaming, social networking, and computer use are all examples of problematic technological applications, particularly among high school kids. The present study aims to assess the impact of technology addiction among school going adolescents. A quantitative approach with non-experimental descriptive research design was adopted for the present study. A 50 school going adolescents were recruited as study participants by using Convenient Sampling Technique. A self-structured questionnaire was administered to collect the demographic information and “Technology Addiction Scale “was used in the research. The present study suggests that the level of technology addiction among school going adolescents, majority of them 27(54%) has mild addiction, 13(26%) has moderate addiction and 10(20%) has severe addiction. Technology addiction has emerged as a major public health issue among Indian youth. To promote healthy technological behaviours, an integrated socio-ecological framework with a multilevel approach that targets risk factors at various levels is required.