Factors Associated with Gaming Addiction Behaviors among Junior High School Students in Nong Phai District, Phetchabun Province
Keywords:
students, game addiction, dormitory residence, family warmthAbstract
Gaming addiction in Thai children and youth is on the rise and negatively impacts their studies and causes problems for society. This descriptive research aimed to study the prevalence of game addiction behavior among junior high school students in Nong Phai District, Phetchabun Province, and to examine the factors associated with game addiction. The study sample consisted of 488 lower secondary school students from three schools of different sizes in the area, selected through proportional simple random sampling. The research instruments included a general information questionnaire and the Game Addiction Screening Test (GAST) developed by the Department of Mental Health, which had validity indices of 0.68 and 0.64, reliability of 0.92, and are suitable for screening game addiction behavior in youth. Data analysis employed descriptive statistics including percentages, means, standard deviations, and inferential statistics using simple logistic regression analysis to test the relationships between certain study factors and game addiction behavior.
The results revealed that 95.51% of the participants engaged in gaming behavior, with 83.42% at a normal level, 13.15% showing game obsession, and 3.52% at a level indicative of game addiction, which was considered lower than the national average and the average in major urban areas. Factors significantly associated with game addiction (p<.05) included: residing in dormitories, lacking friends to talk to or experiencing lack of family warmth, family conflicts, and having a low-grade point average. These findings should be used for crafting nursing interventions to reduce and prevent game addiction in students through integration in nursing in school health services, family nursing, and community-based programs to develop youth life skills for reducing and preventing game addiction.
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