ABSTRACT

The purpose of current study was to investigate the relationship between the approval-motivation, feeling loneliness, self-screening and respecting on social norms), and its effects on overuse of cellular-phone in Persian speaking students in Iran. A total number of 448 students (224 male and 224 female) were selected randomly from Tabriz University of Medical Sciences in Iran during September 2015-February 2016. For gathering data, we designed a researcher-made questionnaire for determining the practice, knowledge and attitude of university students regarding to the impact of inside senses (the ap- proval-motivation, feeling loneliness, self-screening and respecting on social norms) on overuse of cell-phone. Data were analyzed with the software package of SPSS (version 23). Results showed that the studied parameters regard- ing to the dependence on cell-phone had statistically significant differences in terms of gender, age, faculty, education-grades, semester, and residence. There was also a statistical correlation between the approval-motivation, feeling loneliness, self-screening and respecting on social norms and over use of cell- phone. Among the demographic characteristics, approval motivation was only associated with gender.

Subject Areas:

Information Science, Psychology, Sociology

Keywords:

Addiction, Cell-Phone-Phone, Approval Motivation, Students

1. Introduction

One of the human major needs is making interpersonal connection with other people in his/her environment, which is called belonging to the relational community. Feeling of belonging to the similar people causes to feel satisfaction. That is why many people especial the youngers like to keep their relation with their family, friends, classmate and with those who have similar favorites.

The communication technology has the potential ability of making networks by sending and receiving messages in different forms (text, voice, video, audio, picture, and etc.). It has become a widely used tool throughout the world. Cell-phone is an essential part of communication technology that has attracted the attention of people in all ages, especial the young people. They can connect to their favorite social networks by applying their cell-phones everywhere and every time.

Using cell-phone for connecting to social networks is mainly for building relationship with other people, but there are some motivations that force the people to overuse the cell-phone and pleasing long time on social networks. Communication tools such as cell-phone may affect negatively the life of such people. They may lose their concentration during driving, doing their jobs, learning and practicing their courses, and even bothering other people in their environment.

Russell [1] believed that the individuals, who are not able to disregard their cellular-phone, accordingly they will face to the negative consequences of this dependence on their job and daily-life.

Although the results of some studies indicated that there was no major difference between men and women regarding the overuse of cell-phones, however some believes that women use the cell-phone more than men. A study conducted by Oztunc [2] showed that male students use cell-phone more frequently than female students. A significant relationship existed between the problematic use of cell-phone and placement in dormitories, so that students who resided in dormitories, used cell-phones more frequently than those who lived with their family. There was no relationship between the scholar-grades of students with problematic use of cell phone, senses of loneliness, and shame.

Studies showed that the low level of self-esteem may be associated with overuse of cell-phone [3] . Perhaps, the people with low level of self-esteem are in searching improvement, support, encouragement, and admiration among their peers. That is why they tend towards things that may interest them [4] [5] . Therefore, one can say that people with a high motivation level may have the increased tendency towards addictions [5] [6] .

Leung [7] investigated the psychological traits such as sensation seeking, self- esteem, depressing leisure time, age, and gender in association with addiction on cell-phone among 402 youth between 12 - 20 years old and designed a measurement for addiction on mobile-phone. Results showed that people with high impatience during their leisure time and high thrill-seeking behavior are more prone to become addicted on cell-phone. People with high self-esteem level have less such tendencies and people with low level of self-esteem and high thrill- seeking behavior have the most inappropriate use of cell-phone.

Results of other studies showed that young people have more tendencies towards new technologies including cell-phone than the older people. Conse- quently, they spend more time on their cell-phone and are more exposed to problems associated with excessive use of cell-phone [8] [9] . According to our literature searching in the databases of Web of Science, Medline, Eric, Embase, Magiran, Iranmedex, and google-scholar, we did not find any comprehensive study about the reasons that cause to overuse the cell-phone among the students in the region, therefore we aimed to investigate the correlation between the inside senses (the approval-motivation, feeling loneliness, self-screening and respecting of social norms) and the overuse of cell-phone among students in Tabriz.

2. Materials and Methods

A total number of 448 (224 male and 224 female) students were selected randomly from Tabriz University of Medical Sciences in Iran during September 2015-February 2016. The age range of participants was 19 - 50 years; all of them used their own Mobile phones. A total number of 3600 students were studying in different faculties of the University, according to the approval of statistical chancellor of study, 12% of total population were chosen and went under analysis.

For gathering data, we designed a researcher-made questionnaire for determining the practice, knowledge and attitude of university students regarding the impact of inside senses (the approval-motivation, feeling loneliness, self- screening and respecting on social norms) on overuse of cell-phone. In addition, the Mobile phone problematic use scale was used to determine the overuse scale of cell-phone.

Data were analyzed with the software package of SPSS (version 23). The ANCOVA test and multifactor linear regression with Stepwise method were used for comparing group of variables in important demographic variables, with controlling the covariate variables. The quantitative results were shown Mean ± SE and the maximum level of significance was 0.05.

3. Findings

Analysis of gathered data showed that the studied parameters regarding dependence on cell-phone had statistically significant difference among students in terms of gender, age, faculty, education-grade, semester, and residence; so that males arrived later at appointments than females due to over-use of phone, decreasing the quality and efficiency of education and training. The male students were also at high risk to be unable to pay their phone charges compared to the female students. The approval-motivation for using cell-phone among male students was higher than female students. Results are shown in Table 1.

As shown in Table 2, the study indicated that students aged 18 - 20 are more at risk of suffering efficiency loss, poor concentration, more concern on phone shut-down or missing messages, and physical pain due to over-use of cell-phone compared to the female students.

Regarding to the department and semester, using the phone more than intended time, and physical pain due to excessive use of phone was higher among nursing school compared to another department. Senior students arrived later than other students due to phone over-use. Results are shown in Table 3 and Table 4.

In terms of educational level, undergraduate students used cellular-phone longer than the intended time. They were more furious when forced to shut- down their phones, and were late due to the over-use of phone. They also

experienced more decreased concentration, physical pain, decreased efficiency, sleep disorder, and problem at work because of high phone use. Results are shown in Table 5.

In terms of residence situation, those in dormitories used phone more frequently than non-dormitory students to handle their sadness. They arrived later and were more furious when their phones were off. They also showed decreasing efficiency, physical pain, sleep disorders, and trouble at work due of over-use of phone. Results are shown in Table 6.

The other finding of this study was the statistical relationship between the approval motivation and Factor 1 of dependence on mobile-phone, so that approval motivation had the most incremental link with Factor 1 of phone dependence. Among the demographic characteristics the approval motivation had associated only with gender. Results are shown in Table 7.

4. Discussion and Conclusion

The result of analysis showed that some important parameters of problematic use of cell-phone included: phone use over the intended time, arriving late to the appointments. The students experienced decreased concentration, decreased efficiency, and physical pain caused by cell-phone overuse. Inability to pay the phone charges among male students was another problematic issue. Students aged 18 - 20 years, undergraduates, those in dormitories, and nursing students used the cell-phones more frequently than other students. These findings are consistent with results reported by Khazaei about the relationship of age with problematic use of phone. This means that young people were more dependent on phone. The findings are also in agreement with the finding of Aztank regarding dormitory students having more problematic use of phone than non- dormitory students. However, results were inconsistent with the findings of Chan as he reported that women had more problematic use of cell-phone compared to men, arguing that female students have less background for social and face-to-face relations and such devices creates more opportunities for self- expression in relationships due to its capabilities. In addition, there was no difference between students of technical and humanity disciplines in the study by Biglu [10] in terms of dependence to cell-phone-phone. No association was reported between gender and age in terms of dependency on cell-phone by Chan [11] . In the study of Biglu, there was no difference between students of technical and humanity disciplines in terms of dependence on phone, while Chan re-

ported no relationship between gender and age with dependency on phone. This may be due to the fact that students were all in one age group. Given the different pattern of cell-phone use in men and women, the type and amount of use varies. In terms of age, the youth are more attracted to new technologies including cell-phone than the elderly. Therefore, young people spend more time on their cell-phone and are excessively more exposed to the problems of over use of mobile-phone. In terms of residence in dormitory, the students spend more time with their phone due to being away from family and sense of social loneliness, and also possibly due to lack of family controls.

The study also showed that approval motivation had the greatest incremental link with Factor 1 of dependence on cell-phone. Among the demographic characteristics, only approval motivation was associated with gender, so that approval motivation score of men was greater than women, which means that men need more approval motivation than women. Young people with low self-esteem or high approval motivation are seeking for confirmation, support, encouragement, and admiration among their peers and that is why they tend towards things that interest them. Therefore, it can be said that the people with high approval motivation tend to use the devices more excessively. Among the demographic characteristics, it was associated only with gender, so that social customs score was lower in women than men. This means that women are more likely to respect their social customs than men.

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge all students who participated in the study.

Limitation of Study

This study was carried out among 12% of total students from this university. Other comprehensive study is need for showing the total population’s tendency towards problematic use of cell-phone in the University.

Ethical Issues

The study was approved by research affairs of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. All participants were asked to sign an informed written consent before the start of data collection.

Conflict of Interests

Authors declare that there is no conflict of interests.

Cite this paper

Biglu, M.-H., Dadashzadeh, H., Lotfi, F. and Safaiyan, A. (2017) Relationship between Dependency on Cell-Phone and the Inside Senses (Ap- proval-Motivation, Feeling Loneliness, Self- Screening and Respecting Social Norms) in Students. Open Access Library Journal, 4: e3313. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/oalib.1103313

References