In plain language
Does compulsive internet use damage young people's view of themselves, or do young people who already feel bad about themselves retreat into compulsive internet use? Most research could not answer this chicken-and-egg question because it looked at a single point in time. This study followed 2,809 Australian adolescents for four years, from Grade 8 (average age 13.7) to Grade 11, measuring compulsive internet use (CIU)—the inability to regulate one's internet use, with guilt, rumination about being online, and withdrawal from daily activities—alongside self-esteem (feelings of social worth) and hope (feelings of general efficacy in reaching goals).
Using autoregressive cross-lagged structural equation models, the researchers tested two competing accounts: a "CIU-as-antecedent" model, in which compulsive use comes first and erodes self-evaluations, and a "CIU-as-consequence" model, in which low self-esteem and hope drive later compulsive use.
The evidence consistently supported the antecedent model. Compulsive internet use preceded declines in hope and, to a smaller extent, self-esteem across each year of the study. The reverse was not true: adolescents low in self-esteem or hope were no more likely to develop compulsive internet use later. Although the year-to-year effects were modest, they operated over full-year lags across a formative developmental period, suggesting that interventions targeting compulsive internet use are likely to strengthen young people's hope and self-esteem.
Key findings
- 2,809 adolescents completed yearly measures from Grade 8 (mean age 13.7) to Grade 11, making this one of the few long-term longitudinal tests of the direction of effects between compulsive internet use and self-evaluations.
- There was consistent support for the "CIU-as-antecedent" model: compulsive internet use preceded reductions in trait hope and small reductions in self-esteem.
- There was no support for the "CIU-as-consequence" model: low self-esteem and low hope did not predict increases in compulsive internet use over time.
- Year-lagged effects were small (approximately β = −0.08 for hope and β = −0.03 for self-esteem) but comparable to other longitudinal findings on CIU and meaningful over a full-year lag in adolescent development.
- Effects were stable across the four years of adolescence studied, consistent with a developmental equilibrium model.
- The findings suggest interventions that reduce compulsive internet use are likely to strengthen young people's hope and self-esteem, reinforcing calls to address unhealthy internet use early.
How to cite
APA
Donald, J. N., Ciarrochi, J., Parker, P. D., & Sahdra, B. K. (2019). Compulsive internet use and the development of self-esteem and hope: A four-year longitudinal study. Journal of Personality, 87(5), 981–995. https://doi.org/10.1111/jopy.12450
BibTeX
@article{donald2019compulsive,
author = {Donald, James N. and Ciarrochi, Joseph and Parker, Philip D. and Sahdra, Baljinder K.},
title = {Compulsive internet use and the development of self-esteem and hope: A four-year longitudinal study},
journal = {Journal of Personality},
year = {2019},
volume = {87},
number = {5},
pages = {981--995},
doi = {10.1111/jopy.12450}
}
Related work
- All publications by Joseph Ciarrochi (searchable, with free PDFs)
- Process-Based Therapy & Idionomic Analysis
Author: Joseph Ciarrochi (ORCID 0000-0003-0471-8100). Free copy hosted with permission for scholarly use. Please cite the published version via the DOI above.