Multiple Mediating Effects of Family, Friend and Teacher Relationship on the Relation between Stress and Internet Game Addiction of Adolescents

Abstract

This study was aimed at identifying the multiple mediating effects of family, friend, teacher relationship on the effect of stress on internet game addiction of adolescents. For this, we used data on 6,322 middle and high school students culled from the Study of Ways for Improving the Mental Health of Children and Youth III, which was conducted in 2013 by the National Youth Policy Institute. The selected data was analyzed using structural equation models. Our key findings are as follows. First, stress was shown to have positive direct effect on internet game addiction, while the relationships adolescents have with their families, friends, and teachers were shown to have negative direct effect on their internet game addiction. Second, the individual mediating effect of these relationships were shown to be statistically significant in the impact of stress on internet game addiction. These results suggest that in order to solve the problem of internet game addiction caused by stress was need to use the family, friend, teacher relationships of adolescents. Finally, the implications and limitations of these findings were discussed.