Are Males More likely to be Addicted to the Internet than Females? A Meta-Analysis Involving 34 Global Jurisdictions

Publication date: Available online 7 May 2019Source: Computers in Human BehaviorAuthor(s): Wenliang Su, Xiaoli Han, Cheng Jin, Yan Yan, Marc N. PotenzaAbstractInternet addiction (IA) is prevalent and associated with negative measures of health functioning, with males appearing more vulnerable than females. However, little is known about gender-related differences in the effect sizes of IA globally. This multinational meta-analysis addresses this gap in knowledge by providing estimates of effect sizes of gender-related differences in IA tendencies across jurisdictions and how they relate to global national indexes including gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, internet penetration, gender-related gaps in economies, internet penetration, alcohol consumption, smoking prevalence, life satisfaction and suicide rates. One-hundred-and-one studies consisting of 115 independent samples involving 204,352 participants from 34 countries/regions were identified. The average effect size of gender-related differences in IA in a random-effects model was small at g=0.145. The highest gender-related effect sizes were in Asia with g=0.208, and the lowest were in the North America with g=-0.049, Africa with g=0.092 and Europe with g=0.114. Meta-regression revealed that smaller effect sizes were observed in nations with greater GDP per capita and higher internet penetration. As operationalized, both the internet availability and social norms hypotheses were supported by effect sizes being pos...
Source: Computers in Human Behavior - Category: Information Technology Source Type: research