Front. Psychol. | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01181
Yu Tian1* and Fengqiang Gao1*
- 1Shandong Normal University, China
Abstract
The current study examined the associations between specific Internet activities (online shopping, pornography use, social networking site use, and Internet gaming), life satisfaction, and the mediating effects of loneliness and depression for these associations. Participants were 5,215 students (2,303 male participants, Mage = 16.20 years; ranging in age from 10 to 23 years) from various school types (546 elementary school students, 1710 junior high school students, 688 senior high school students, and 2271 university students) who provided self-report data on demographic variables, online shopping, pornography use, social networking site use, loneliness, depression, and life satisfaction. The results indicated that after controlling for demographic variables (gender and age) (a) loneliness and depression had fully positive mediating effects on the association between social networking site use and life satisfaction; (b) loneliness and depression played fully negative mediating effects on life satisfaction associations with online shopping, pornography use, and Internet gaming. Therefore, loneliness and depression were the underlying mechanisms that caused life satisfaction to be affected by online shopping, pornography use, social networking site use, and Internet gaming.
Keywords: specific Internet use, Loneliness, Depression, life satisfaction, mediating effects
Received: 12 Mar 2018; Accepted: 19 Jun 2018.
Edited by:
Claudio Longobardi, Università degli Studi di Torino, Italy
Reviewed by:
Kevin L. Blankenship, Iowa State University, United States
JESÚS NICASIO GARCÍA SÁNCHEZ, Universidad de León, Spain
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