Addiction like Behaviour of Mobile Phone Using Medical Students of Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, Sri Amritsar

Abstract

Introduction: Sri Guru Ram Das Institute of Medical Sciences and Research is a tertiary health care institution. The adoption of mobile phones promotes an addiction-like behaviour and is evolving as a public health problem that renders them at risk of developing addictions. Aim and Objective: To study and compare the addiction like behaviour of mobile phone using adolescent and young adult medical students of SGRDIMSAR. Material and Methods: This was a cross sectional type of study conducted amongst adolescent (age < 19years) and young adult (age >19 years) medical students of SGRDIMSAR, Sri Amritsar from October 2018 to January 2019 upon 412 medical students willing to participate in the study. These medical students were divided into two groups i.e. adolescents and young adults. A series of 20 standardised questions having two responses i.e. agree and disagree was used to assess their addiction like behaviour. The effects of mobile phone on it’s users were divided into following groups i.e. Anxiety, Lack of control, Lack of priority for urgent matters, Trouble caused to mobile phone user and other addiction like effects of mobile phone use. These were analyzed statistically by applying the ꭓ2 test and the valid conclusions were drawn. Results: Total 412 medical students of SGRDIMSAR were studied. Among these students 102 (24.7%) were the adolescents and 310 (75.3%) were young adults. Among the 20 questions related to the addiction like behaviour of the medical students using the mobile phones, for the 19 questions, higher percentage of young adults was found than the adolescents who agreed for the questions asked. For question regarding complaining by friends and family about their excessive mobile phone use higher number and percentage, 163 (55.8%) of adolescents agreed as compared to young adults, 57 (52.5%), that was contrary to the responses given by them to the other questions. Conclusion: Higher percentage had shown the addiction like behaviour in young adults than adolescents due mobile phone use. This might be due to the reason that they had higher age; thus they might have used the mobile phones for the longer period of time. It is recommended that further studies should be conducted on smartphone users and large sample size of study subjects should be taken. Now among the students using mobile phones/smartphones; as both are in use now, early diagnosis and management of addiction like behavior should be done.