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Impulsivity traits and Facebook addiction in young people and the potential mediating role of coping styles
Personality and Individual Differences 161 (2020) 109965
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Impulsivity traits and Facebook addiction in young people and the potential mediating role of coping styles James Fowler (BPsySc(Hon))a, Matthew J. Gullo (PhD)b, Rachel A. Elphinston (PhD)a,c,d,e,
T
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a
School of Psychology, Level 3, McElwain Building, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Brisbane, Queensland, 4072, Australia Centre for Youth Substance Abuse Research, The University of Queensland, 17 Upland Road, St Lucia, Brisbane, Queensland, 4067, Australia c Recover Injury Research Centre, The University of Queensland, Level 7, 288 Herston Road, Herston, Brisbane, Queensland, 4006, Australia d NHMRC CRE in Road Traffic Injury Recovery, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia e Metro South Addiction and Mental Health Service, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia b
ARTICLE INFO
ABSTRACT
Keywords: Facebook addiction Impulsivity Personality Coping Young people
Impulsivity traits are important predictors of substance use problems and behavioural addictions such as online gaming. However, little is known about to what extent the two related neuropsychological systems of rash impulsiveness and reward drive contribute to Facebook addiction, or the mechanisms of impulsivity risk. The aim of this study was to examine the role of emotion-focused and avoidance coping as potential mediators of the link between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, while controlling for reward drive. Participants (N = 244) were young people aged 18–25 years recruited from the first-year undergraduate research participant pool and via convenience sampling which involved the first author sharing the study on his Facebook page. Participants completed online, validated measures of Facebook addiction, emotion-focused and avoidant coping styles, rash impulsiveness and reward drive. Results showed that when controlling for reward drive, emotionfocused coping mediated the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. Results also showed that rash impulsiveness but not reward drive was directly associated with Facebook addiction. These findings have implications for designing targeted cognitive behavioural treatments that consider biologicallybased personality factors such as rash impulsiveness and cognitive factors such as emotion-focused coping to reduce harmful levels of Facebook addiction.
1. Introduction Facebook addiction, also referred to as problematic Facebook use or Facebook intrusion is described as an excessive attachment to Facebook that negatively impacts on daily functioning (Elphinston & Noller, 2011). Numerous investigations have highlighted the potential detrimental impacts of excessive Facebook use and Facebook addiction on an individual's general wellbeing, as well as psychological, social and physical health (Elphinston & Noller, 2011; Frost & Rickwood, 2017; Kross et al., 2013; Marino, Gini, Vieno & Spada, 2018). This growing evidence suggests that Facebook addiction might be an emerging mental health problem requiring significant attention (Błachnio, Przepiorka & Pantic, 2015; Griffiths, Kuss & Demetrovics, 2014; Ryan, Chester, Reece & Xenos, 2014; Andreassen et al., 2016). Impulsivity has been widely studied as a strong personality risk factor for adolescent and adult substance use disorders and gambling problems (Gullo et al., 2017; Hodgins & Holub, 2015; Stautz & Cooper, 2013; Verdejo-Garcia, Lawrence & Clark, 2008). Research has ⁎
also shown that impulsivity is linked with other emerging behavioural addictions yet to be classified as psychiatric conditions, such as Internet addiction (Cao, Su, Liu & Gao, 2007; Lee et al., 2012; Ünsalver & Aktepe, 2017) and online gaming (Şalvarlı & Griffiths, 2019). Although substance use and behavioural addictions share similar biological and behavioural characteristics (Grant, Potenza, Weinstein & Gorelick, 2010; Griffiths, 2005), there is currently limited research exploring how a biological predisposition towards impulsivity conveys risk for Facebook addiction. There is increasing recognition that impulsivity is not a unitary construct, but rather a family of related but unique dimensions. Two neuropsychologically-based systems of impulsivity have been described: reward sensitivity and appetitive motivation towards goals (reward sensitivity/drive), and difficulty inhibiting approach behaviour despite likely negative consequences (rash impulsiveness) (Dawe, Gullo & Loxton, 2004; Franken, Muris & Georgieva, 2006; Gullo & Dawe, 2008; Gullo, Loxton & Dawe, 2014; Steinberg et al., 2008; Wahlstrom, Collins, White & Luciana, 2010)..According to this dual-
Corresponding author at: Recover Injury Research Centre, Level 7, 288 Herston Road, Herston, Brisbane, Queensland, 4006, Australia. E-mail address: [email protected] (R.A. Elphinston).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.109965 Received 16 December 2019; Received in revised form 2 March 2020; Accepted 2 March 2020 0191-8869/ Crown Copyright © 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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factor model, rash impulsiveness and reward drive are related (Dawe & Loxton, 2004) with both dimensions associated with independent pathways of substance use risk (Gullo, Ward, Dawe, Powell & Jackson, 2011). Previous studies have suggested that deficits in self-control and impulsive decision-making are implicated in Facebook addiction. Błachnio and Przepiorka (2016) showed that lower levels of self-control were associated with Facebook addiction. Delaney, Stein and Gruber (2017) examined the links between impulsive decision making and Facebook addiction using a delayed reward task. Individuals who chose a small, instant reward (at the expense of a larger, delayed reward) reported higher levels of Facebook addiction. Both studies used unidimensional measures of impulsivity despite the notable shared variance between rash impulsiveness and reward drive (Dawe & Loxton, 2004). The role of reward drive in Facebook addiction is less clear. In studies of Internet addiction, findings have been mixed. Some research has shown that individuals classified as addicted to the Internet scored significantly lower on sensation seeking (Lavin, Marvin, McLarney, Nola & Scott, 1999), which is closely related to reward drive (Gullo et al., 2014), while in other studies, they score higher in sensation seeking (Lin & Tsai, 2002; Müller, Dreier, Beutel & Wölfling, 2016). Given the theoretical distinction between reward drive and rash impulsiveness, we might expect differential effects on addictive behaviours. However, in these studies, it is unknown whether Internet-based behaviours reflect gambling, gaming, or social networking site use and whether highly stimulating sites were visited more frequently. It is also unknown whether the online social networking environment of Facebook provides users with similar rewarding features associated with other behavioural addictions (e.g., gambling; Internet gaming). Previous research has suggested that rash impulsiveness might be a more important predictor of Internet-based addictions than reward drive (Armstrong, Phillips & Saling, 2000; Lavin et al., 1999; Meerkerk, van den Eijnden, Franken & Garretsen, 2010). Overall, previous findings should be interpreted with caution as no studies have accounted for the potential unique contributions of rash impulsiveness and reward drive in the study of Facebook addiction. Research also points to the role of dysfunctional coping styles such as avoidance or emotion-focused coping (Higgins & Endler, 1995) as important factors in online behavioural addictions. McNicol and Thorsteinnston (2017) showed that individuals addicted to the Internet were more likely to use avoidance and emotion-focused coping styles. Błachnio, Przepiorka and Czuczwar (2017) also found that avoidance coping as well as an emotion-focused coping style were associated with higher levels of Facebook intrusion (addiction) and greater intensity of Facebook use. There is a basis for proposing that maladaptive coping styles might be mechanisms through which impulsivity influences Facebook addiction. Coping is considered an umbrella term for conscious efforts to regulate emotion, cognition, and behaviour in response to stress (Compas, Connor-Smith, Saltzman, Thomsen & Wadsworth, 2001). In this way, it involves self-reflection which is dependent on self-control resources (Ochsner & Gross, 2008). According to the differential choice model (Galla & Wood, 2015), trait self-control (i.e., low rash impulsiveness) is linked to the use of more reflective coping strategies, rather than automatic or involuntary coping. It is therefore possible that low self-control (impulsive tendencies) might be related to less reflective, and more automatic coping strategies. These strategies are likely to involve emotion-focused, avoidant, and potentially maladaptive styles. Identifying if these cognitive variables might function as modifiable factors carries implications for designing targeted interventions that could effectively prevent or treat Facebook addiction. The aim of the current research is to investigate the potential mediating role of emotion-focused and avoidance coping styles in the link between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, while controlling for reward drive in young adults. It was hypothesised that rash impulsiveness would be associated with more emotion-focused and
avoidant coping, which in turn would be associated with higher levels of Facebook addiction when controlling for reward drive. It was further predicted that rash impulsiveness, not reward drive would be positively associated with Facebook addiction based on: 1) consistent empirical evidence for an association between high rash impulsiveness and Internet-based addiction; 2) inconsistent evidence for reward drive. Reward drive-related traits have been associated with greater and lesser Internet-based addiction, possibly due to the lack of control for shared variance with rash impulsiveness. This is the first study to our knowledge that has examined maladaptive coping styles as potential mediating mechanisms of a two-factor model of impulsivity on Facebook addiction. 2. Materials and methods 2.1. Participants A total of 318 participants were recruited to the study between July and September 2018. To be eligible, participants were aged between 18 and 25 years old and had an active Facebook account. A total of 26 participants did not complete any of the survey components and 48 participants partially completed the measures. The final sample size was 244. 187 participants were undergraduate psychology students, who participated for course credit and 57 participants were recruited via convenience sampling which involved the first author (who is a student) sharing the study on his Facebook page and requesting the details be further circulated. 2.2. Measures Demographics. Participants were asked about their age, sex, living arrangements, highest level of completed education, and the amount of time per week (in hours) they spent on Facebook. Facebook addiction. Addiction to Facebook was measured using the Facebook Intrusion Questionnaire (Elphinston & Noller, 2011). This is a validated and widely used measure of Facebook addiction (Błachnio et al., 2017; Elphinston & Noller, 2011). This measure contains eight items, scored on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). Item responses are summed, with higher numbers indicating higher levels of Facebook addiction. An example item includes “I often think about Facebook when I am not using it”. This measure had good reliability, α = 0.83. Coping styles. Coping styles were measured using the emotion-focused and avoidance subscales of the Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (Endler & Parker, 1990). Each subscale contains 16 items and asks participants how often they use a particular method of coping to manage stress on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 5 = always). An example item from the emotion-focused subscale is “Get very upset", while “Go out for a snack or meal” is an example item from the avoidance subscale. Cronbach's alpha for the emotion-focused subscale was 0.90 and 0.85 for the avoidance subscale. Impulsivity traits. The impulsivity subscale from The Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory of Personality Questionnaire (Corr & Cooper, 2016) was used to measure rash impulsiveness. This measure contains eight items measured on a 4-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 4 = highly). An example item includes “I find myself doing things on the spur of the moment”. This measure is a valid and reliable measure of impulsivity (Corr & Cooper, 2016) and was chosen for its brevity. While this scale has not been formally shown in a factor analytic study to load on a higher-order Rash Impulsiveness factor with other putative scales, its demonstrated correlations with rash impulsiveness-like traits is strongly suggestive that it would (Corr & Cooper, 2016). In this study, it had good reliability (α = 0.79). Reward drive was measured using four items from the fun seeking subscale of the Behavioural Inhibition and Behavioural Activation Survey (Carver & White, 1994). This measure is a valid and reliable measure of reward drive so long as care is taken to 2
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control for any shared variance with rash impulsiveness (Gullo et al., 2011). Participants were asked how much they agree with an item on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = none at all, 5 = very true for me). An example item includes “I crave excitement and new sensations”. This measure had good reliability (α = 0.79).
Table 1 Sample characteristics. Demographic variables Age
2.3. Procedure Participants completed the online survey using Qualtrics with informed consent provided prior to participation. The order of measures was randomised to avoid fatigue effects. Undergraduate students in the first-year participant pool received course credit for their time. Ethical clearance was obtained from The University of Queensland Human Ethics Research Committee.
Sex
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
Male Female Other Living arrangements With parents Share accommodation With a friend University accommodation Alone With a partner Other Highest level of education completed Year 10 high school Year 12 high school Diploma/certification Undergraduate degree Undergraduate degree with Honours
2.4. Data analytic plan This study used a cross-sectional design. Following data screening, frequencies, means and standard deviations were calculated for all sample characteristics and questionnaire scores. Bivariate correlations were used to assess the correlations between all variables in a preliminary analysis. A percentile bootstrapped multiple mediation model using PROCESS macro (Model 4) version 3.4 in SPSS (A. F. Hayes, 2017) was conducted to assess the mediating roles of coping styles (avoidance and emotion-focused) on the relationship between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction controlling for reward drive. Reward drive, age, sex, and time spent on Facebook were included as covariates. To examine the total, direct, and indirect effects (5000 iterations), percentile-based 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) were inspected, with estimates considered significant when the CIs do not span zero. In PROCESS, covariates entered are treated as predictors in the regression equation allowing for the total and direct effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. For indirect effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction via coping styles, the model was re-run with a common seed set for bootstrap sampling at each run included to eliminate variability associated with random sampling.
N (%) 66 38 30 36 29 21 11 13
(27%) (15.6%) (12.3%) (14.8%) (11.9% (8.6%) (4.5%) (5.3%)
81 (33.2%) 162 (66.4%) 1 (0.4%) 112 (45.9%) 45 (18.4%) 28 (11.5%) 27 (11.1%) 16 (6.6%) 10 (4.1%) 6 (2.5%) 3 (1.2%) 149 (61.1%) 33 (13.5%) 49 (20.1%) 10 (4.1%)
Note. Total N = 244.
3.3. Mediation model The potential relationships between rash impulsiveness, coping styles, and Facebook addiction, controlling for reward drive, age, sex, and time spent on Facebook were examined using a percentile bootstrapped multiple mediation analysis. Refer to Fig. 1 and Table 3 for a summary of the analysis. The results showed that there were significant direct effects of rash impulsiveness on avoidance coping (95% CI [lower limit = 0.37, upper limit = 0.92]) and emotion-focused coping styles (95% CI [lower limit = 0.33, upper limit = 0.97]). Emotion-focused coping had a direct effect on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = 0.02, upper limit = 0.20]) while avoidance coping did not have a direct significant effect on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = −0.02, upper limit = 0.19]). The findings indicated a significant indirect effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction through emotion-focused coping (95% CI [lower limit = 0.01, upper limit = 0.16]). However, there was no indirect effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction through avoidance coping (95% CI [lower limit = −0.01, upper limit = 0.13]). The direct effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction was significant (95% CI [lower limit = 0.10, upper limit = 0.57]) but the direct effect of reward drive on Facebook addiction was not significant (95% CI [lower limit = −0.53, upper limit = 0.22]). There was a significant total effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = 0.24, upper limit = 0.68]). For completeness, a full summary of the direct, indirect, and total effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction via avoidance and emotion-focused coping is shown in Table 3. In short, there were no significant direct effects of reward drive on avoidance or emotion-focused coping, or significant indirect effects via avoidance or emotion-focused coping, or significant total effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction.
3. Results 3.1. Missing data analysis and sample characteristics A Missing Values Analysis indicated that 48 participants had between 6.4% and 12.4% of data missing. Little's Missing Completely at Random test showed that data was missing completely at random (χ2 = 24.81, p = 0.59), therefore listwise deletion was performed. All data met assumptions of normality and collinearity. Demographic variables are shown in Table 1. The mean age of the sample was 20.39 years (SD = 2.14). Means, standard deviations and frequencies of all variables are reported in Table 2. Mean scores on Facebook addiction were consistent with previous research (Błachnio et al., 2017; Elphinston & Noller, 2011). 3.2. Preliminary descriptive analyses Bivariate correlations were conducted between facets of impulsivity (rash impulsiveness and reward drive), coping styles (avoidance and emotion-focused), and Facebook addiction. Refer to Table 2 for a summary. Results showed that rash impulsiveness was significantly positively associated with Facebook addiction, while reward drive was not significantly correlated with Facebook addiction. Rash impulsiveness was associated with higher levels of avoidance coping and emotion-focused coping. Both avoidance and emotion-focused coping styles were significantly positively associated with Facebook addiction.
4. Discussion This research investigated the relationships between rash impulsiveness, emotion-focused and avoidant coping styles, and Facebook addiction in young people while controlling for reward drive. Results 3
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Table 2 Correlations and means of key variables. Variables
Mean
SD
Range
1
2
3
4
5
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
15.43 24.00 16.36 14.70 47.11 45.15
14.94 8.44 5.02 2.96 10.63 11.98
1–100 8–50 8–29 4–20 21–76 18–78
– 0.29*** 0.09 −0.04 0.04 0.05
– – 0.27*** 0.05 0.20*** 0.24***
– – – 0.45*** 0.35*** 0.23***
– – – – 0.24*** 0.04
– – – – – 0.34***
Average weekly Facebook use (in hours) Facebook addiction Rash impulsiveness Reward drive Avoidance coping Emotion-focused coping
Note. N = 244; ***p < 0.001. SD = Standard deviation. Table 3 Mediation analysis testing the indirect effects of rash impulsiveness and reward drive on Facebook addiction via coping styles.
Fig. 1. Mediation model. Note. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. Reward drive was treated as a predictor in the regression equation allowing for the effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. Other covariates in the model were age, sex, and time spent per week on Facebook. Unstandardized coefficients for direct paths are presented. Direct (non-significant) paths from reward drive to avoidance and emotion-focused coping were not presented for clarity. All path coefficients are presented in Table 3. Dashed lines represent non-significant associations.
Paths
Unstandardised coefficient
SE
Standardised coefficient
95% CI of unstandardised coefficient
a1 a2 a3 a4 b1 b2 c’^ c’^^ a1b1 a2b2 a3b1 a4b2 a1b1+a2b2 a3b1+a4b2 c^ c^^
0.65 0.65 0.35 −0.34 0.08 0.11 0.33 −0.16 0.05 0.07 0.03 −0.04 0.13 −0.01 0.46 −0.17
0.14 0.16 0.24 0.28 0.05 0.05 0.12 0.19 0.04 0.04 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.11 0.19
0.31 0.27 0.10 −0.08 0.10 0.16 0.20 −0.05 0.03 0.04 0.01 −0.01 0.07 −0.01 0.27 −0.06
LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL:
0.37 UL: 0.92 0.33 UL: 0.97 −0.12 UL: 0.82 −0.89 UL: 0.20 −0.02 UL: 0.19 0.02 UL: 0.20 0.10 UL: 0.57 −0.53 UL: 0.22 −0.01 UL: 0.13 0.01 UL: 0.16 −0.02 UL: 0.10 −0.14 UL: 0.02 0.04 UL: 0.23 −0.14 UL: 0.09 0.24 UL: 0.68 −0.54 UL: 0.21
Note. Reward drive was treated as a predictor in the regression equation allowing for the effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. Other covariates in the model were age, sex, and time spent per week on Facebook. CI = Confidence interval. SE = Standard error. LL = Lower limit; UL = Upper limit. c^ = total effect of rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction. c^^ = total effect of reward drive → Facebook addiction. c’^ = direct effect of rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction controlling for mediators. c’^^ = direct effect of reward drive → Facebook addiction controlling for mediators. a1 = rash impulsiveness → avoidance. a2 = rash impulsiveness → emotion-focused. a3 = reward drive → avoidance. a4 = reward drive → emotion-focused. b1 = avoidance → Facebook addiction. b2 = emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a1b1 = rash impulsiveness → avoidance → Facebook addiction. a2b2 = rash impulsiveness → emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a1b1+a2b2 = total indirect effects rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction. a3b1 = reward drive → avoidance → Facebook addiction. a4b2 = reward drive → emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a3b1+a4b2 = total indirect effects reward drive → Facebook addiction.
showed that emotion-focused coping significantly mediated the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, controlling for the reward-seeking aspect of impulsivity. Rash impulsiveness was also found to be directly associated with Facebook addiction but not reward drive. Contrary to hypotheses, avoidance coping did not mediate the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. Our results add to previous studies that have shown that impulsivity is associated with substance use (Gullo et al., 2017, 2011; Stautz & Cooper, 2013; Verdejo-Garcia et al., 2008) as well as behavioural addictions (Błachnio & Przepiorka, 2016; Delaney et al., 2017; Lee et al., 2012; Ünsalver & Aktepe, 2017) and extend this previous research by showing that the rash impulsiveness dimension of impulsivity plays a unique role in Facebook addiction. Previous studies have not accounted for the dimensional components of impulsivity that might be related to Facebook addiction. Our findings support related research that points to rash impulsiveness as a more important factor than the reward drive system in online behavioural addictions (Armstrong et al., 2000; Dawe et al., 2004; Meerkerk et al., 2010). According to the dual-factor model, activation of the rash impulsiveness system is related to response disinhibition or an inability to inhibit approach tendencies. It is possible that Facebook might lack a high degree of positive reinforcement that substance use and some behavioural addictions might provide. Indeed, it could be more negatively reinforcing as there is a greater element of fear of missing out and maintenance of social relations here than in amphetamine use or gambling. Furthermore, research suggests that the independent contributions of reward drive and rash impulsivity are complex; with reward drive playing a greater role during the initial stages of addiction (Dawe et al., 2004) rather than perpetuating a downward spiral of addiction over time. We did not measure how long individuals had been using Facebook, or the trajectory towards addictive behaviours. Longitudinal research is required to
capture the independent roles of impulsivity and its facets over time and its potential causal influence on the development and maintenance of Facebook addiction. The results also show that emotion-focused coping might be an important mechanism through which rash impulsiveness is associated with Facebook addiction. It also adds to previous evidence for the role of emotion-focused coping on Facebook addiction (Błachnio et al., 2017; McNicol & Thorsteinsson, 2017). These findings are in line with theoretical models of coping, which suggest that deficits in self-control result in a reliance on automatic, maladaptive coping responses that downplay reflective capacity and an ability to regulate emotional distress (Galla & Wood, 2015). It is possible that individuals who are predisposed to rash impulsiveness may be especially vulnerable to a style of emotional coping which involves self-blame and feelings of anxiety. In this way, these individuals have a general tendency to respond to distress with more automatic emotional reactions (Galla & Wood, 2015), which can perpetuate excessive use and addictive 4
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tendencies towards Facebook. Given the high risk of substance use and mental health problems in young people (Lubman, Allen, Rogers, Cementon & Bonomo, 2007; Riggs, Baker, Mikulich, Young & Crowley, 1995), it is possible that emotion-focused coping is a shared transdiagnostic factor which could be explored further in different addiction contexts. The present findings suggested that, contrary to predictions, an avoidance coping style might not be as important as emotion-focused coping in the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. In this study, avoidance coping was measured using the avoidance subscale of the Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (Endler & Parker, 1990), which largely reflects behavioural avoidance strategies such as social diversion rather than experiential avoidance strategies. Given that experiential avoidance is associated with addiction (S. C. Hayes, Wilson, Gifford, Follette & Strosahl, 1996), it is possible that behavioural and experiential approaches may foster different outcomes. It might also be that behavioural avoidance might not always be deleterious in all stressful situations. Future research should examine the potential moderating role of current stress and if behavioural versus experiential avoidance has specific effects on Facebook addiction. Younger people are particularly vulnerable to developing an addiction to online behaviours such as Facebook as they are prone to impulsive behaviour (Chamorro et al., 2012) due to developing brain structures (Chambers, Taylor & Potenza, 2003). The normative way in which social media has evolved as part of everyday life might also be increasing the cultural acceptability of high, intensive use (Ahn, 2011). As such, there is a significant need for early intervention as individuals move into adulthood to prevent negative trajectories of addiction and dependency. To date, there is a paucity of well-designed treatment studies targeting Internet addiction (Zajac, Ginley, Chang & Petry, 2017) and there are currently no efficacious interventions for Facebook addiction. Possible treatment targets may include practicing mindfulness to reduce rash impulsiveness, and increasing emotional awareness and problem-solving skills to reduce emotion-focused coping. It is plausible that targeting both factors could have added benefits in reducing levels of Facebook addiction; though more research is required to determine their clinical effectiveness. In this study, we measured two important dimensional constructs of impulsivity – rash impulsiveness and reward drive. Currently, pre-existing models of substance use and addiction are used to guide approaches to understanding risk factors for Facebook addiction. More research is required to elucidate the social-cognitive and neuropsychological factors such as self-efficacy, social-engagement, and expectations of Facebook use that might contribute to the maintenance of Facebook addiction. This is especially important as it has been suggested that umbrella technology-mediated behaviours such as the Internet itself are not addictive, but can act as a medium through which certain behaviours such as Facebook use might become addictive (Baggio et al., 2018). As the scientific community moves toward establishing clinical classifications of technology-based addictions, greater attention to the specific role of other media applications will be needed. Limitations of the present study should be acknowledged. A crosssectional design was used, and therefore our ability to infer causality and directionality of the relationships cannot be determined. The generalisability of these results is restricted to young people (18–25-years old). Two sampling methods were used. It is possible that sampling biases may be present based on differences in motivation to participate. While there is evidence to suggest that recruiting from online platforms such as Facebook/MTurk may be equivocal in representativeness to undergraduate samples (Briones & Benham, 2017; Shaver et al., 2019) future studies could stratify based on recruitment method. Future research should test whether the findings can generalise to adolescent samples who might be particularly vulnerable if exposed to social networking sites at a young age (Spies Shapiro & Margolin, 2014) as well as treatment-seeking individuals; though the ability to recruit
clinical samples is often challenging as few individuals are currently seeking help from specialist addiction services for online behavioural addictions. The measure of Facebook addiction used in this study was based on the components model of addiction (Griffiths, 2005) and does not reflect DSM-5 advances in the field. In addition to self-report measures, corroboration through clinical interviews could improve the comprehensiveness of assessments of Facebook addiction. 5. Conclusions This study showed that based on the dual-factor model of impulsivity, rash impulsiveness, but not reward drive was an important factor associated with Facebook addiction. Our results also provide an explanation for how rash impulsiveness conveys risk for Facebook addition through mechanisms of coping. Future treatments for Facebook addiction could be enhanced by focusing on the particular biologicallybased personality trait of rash impulsiveness as well as emotion-focused coping styles. Author disclosure statements Role of funding sources No funding sources were provided. Contributors Fowler and Elphinston designed the study and conducted the primary literature review and Gullo provided additional articles. Fowler collected and analysed data with oversight from Elphinston. Fowler and Elphinston developed the first draft of the manuscript, and all authors contributed to edits and approved the final manuscript. Declaration of Competing Interest The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. Acknowledgements MJG is supported by a Medical Research Future Fund Translating Research into Practice (TRIP) Fellowship (1167986). References Ahn, J. (2011). The effect of social network sites on adolescents' social and academic development: Current theories and controversies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 62(8), 1435–1445. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi. 21540. Andreassen, C S, Billieux, J., Griffiths, M. D., Kuss, D. J., Demetrovics, Z., Mazzoni, E., et al. (2016). The relationship between addictive use of social media and video games and symptoms of psychiatric disorders: A large-scale cross-sectional study. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 30(2), 252–262. https://doi.org/10.1037/adb0000160. Armstrong, L., Phillips, J. G., & Saling, L. L. (2000). Potential determinants of heavier internet usage. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(4), 537–550. https://doi.org/10.1006/ijhc.2000.0400. Baggio, S., Starcevic, V., Studer, J., Simon, O., Gainsbury, S. M., Gmel, G., et al. (2018). Technology-mediated addictive behaviors constitute a spectrum of related yet distinct conditions: A network perspective. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 32(5), 564–572. https://doi.org/10.1037/adb0000379. Błachnio, A., & Przepiorka, A. (2016). Dysfunction of self-regulation and self-control in Facebook addiction. Psychiatric Quarterly, 87(3), 493–500. https://doi.org/10.1007/ s11126-015-9403-1. Błachnio, A., Przepiorka, A., & Czuczwar, S. J. (2017). Type D personality, stress coping strategies and self-efficacy as predictors of Facebook intrusion. Psychiatry Research, 253, 33–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2017.03.022. Błachnio, A., Przepiorka, A., & Pantic, I. (2015). Internet use, Facebook intrusion, and depression: Results of a cross-sectional study. European Psychiatry, 30(6), 681–684. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eurpsy.2015.04.002. Briones, E. M., & Benham, G. (2017). An examination of the equivalency of self-report measures obtained from crowdsourced versus undergraduate student samples. Behavior Research Methods, 49(1), 320–334. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-0160710-8.
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Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid
Impulsivity traits and Facebook addiction in young people and the potential mediating role of coping styles James Fowler (BPsySc(Hon))a, Matthew J. Gullo (PhD)b, Rachel A. Elphinston (PhD)a,c,d,e,
T
⁎
a
School of Psychology, Level 3, McElwain Building, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Brisbane, Queensland, 4072, Australia Centre for Youth Substance Abuse Research, The University of Queensland, 17 Upland Road, St Lucia, Brisbane, Queensland, 4067, Australia c Recover Injury Research Centre, The University of Queensland, Level 7, 288 Herston Road, Herston, Brisbane, Queensland, 4006, Australia d NHMRC CRE in Road Traffic Injury Recovery, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia e Metro South Addiction and Mental Health Service, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia b
ARTICLE INFO
ABSTRACT
Keywords: Facebook addiction Impulsivity Personality Coping Young people
Impulsivity traits are important predictors of substance use problems and behavioural addictions such as online gaming. However, little is known about to what extent the two related neuropsychological systems of rash impulsiveness and reward drive contribute to Facebook addiction, or the mechanisms of impulsivity risk. The aim of this study was to examine the role of emotion-focused and avoidance coping as potential mediators of the link between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, while controlling for reward drive. Participants (N = 244) were young people aged 18–25 years recruited from the first-year undergraduate research participant pool and via convenience sampling which involved the first author sharing the study on his Facebook page. Participants completed online, validated measures of Facebook addiction, emotion-focused and avoidant coping styles, rash impulsiveness and reward drive. Results showed that when controlling for reward drive, emotionfocused coping mediated the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. Results also showed that rash impulsiveness but not reward drive was directly associated with Facebook addiction. These findings have implications for designing targeted cognitive behavioural treatments that consider biologicallybased personality factors such as rash impulsiveness and cognitive factors such as emotion-focused coping to reduce harmful levels of Facebook addiction.
1. Introduction Facebook addiction, also referred to as problematic Facebook use or Facebook intrusion is described as an excessive attachment to Facebook that negatively impacts on daily functioning (Elphinston & Noller, 2011). Numerous investigations have highlighted the potential detrimental impacts of excessive Facebook use and Facebook addiction on an individual's general wellbeing, as well as psychological, social and physical health (Elphinston & Noller, 2011; Frost & Rickwood, 2017; Kross et al., 2013; Marino, Gini, Vieno & Spada, 2018). This growing evidence suggests that Facebook addiction might be an emerging mental health problem requiring significant attention (Błachnio, Przepiorka & Pantic, 2015; Griffiths, Kuss & Demetrovics, 2014; Ryan, Chester, Reece & Xenos, 2014; Andreassen et al., 2016). Impulsivity has been widely studied as a strong personality risk factor for adolescent and adult substance use disorders and gambling problems (Gullo et al., 2017; Hodgins & Holub, 2015; Stautz & Cooper, 2013; Verdejo-Garcia, Lawrence & Clark, 2008). Research has ⁎
also shown that impulsivity is linked with other emerging behavioural addictions yet to be classified as psychiatric conditions, such as Internet addiction (Cao, Su, Liu & Gao, 2007; Lee et al., 2012; Ünsalver & Aktepe, 2017) and online gaming (Şalvarlı & Griffiths, 2019). Although substance use and behavioural addictions share similar biological and behavioural characteristics (Grant, Potenza, Weinstein & Gorelick, 2010; Griffiths, 2005), there is currently limited research exploring how a biological predisposition towards impulsivity conveys risk for Facebook addiction. There is increasing recognition that impulsivity is not a unitary construct, but rather a family of related but unique dimensions. Two neuropsychologically-based systems of impulsivity have been described: reward sensitivity and appetitive motivation towards goals (reward sensitivity/drive), and difficulty inhibiting approach behaviour despite likely negative consequences (rash impulsiveness) (Dawe, Gullo & Loxton, 2004; Franken, Muris & Georgieva, 2006; Gullo & Dawe, 2008; Gullo, Loxton & Dawe, 2014; Steinberg et al., 2008; Wahlstrom, Collins, White & Luciana, 2010)..According to this dual-
Corresponding author at: Recover Injury Research Centre, Level 7, 288 Herston Road, Herston, Brisbane, Queensland, 4006, Australia. E-mail address: [email protected] (R.A. Elphinston).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.109965 Received 16 December 2019; Received in revised form 2 March 2020; Accepted 2 March 2020 0191-8869/ Crown Copyright © 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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factor model, rash impulsiveness and reward drive are related (Dawe & Loxton, 2004) with both dimensions associated with independent pathways of substance use risk (Gullo, Ward, Dawe, Powell & Jackson, 2011). Previous studies have suggested that deficits in self-control and impulsive decision-making are implicated in Facebook addiction. Błachnio and Przepiorka (2016) showed that lower levels of self-control were associated with Facebook addiction. Delaney, Stein and Gruber (2017) examined the links between impulsive decision making and Facebook addiction using a delayed reward task. Individuals who chose a small, instant reward (at the expense of a larger, delayed reward) reported higher levels of Facebook addiction. Both studies used unidimensional measures of impulsivity despite the notable shared variance between rash impulsiveness and reward drive (Dawe & Loxton, 2004). The role of reward drive in Facebook addiction is less clear. In studies of Internet addiction, findings have been mixed. Some research has shown that individuals classified as addicted to the Internet scored significantly lower on sensation seeking (Lavin, Marvin, McLarney, Nola & Scott, 1999), which is closely related to reward drive (Gullo et al., 2014), while in other studies, they score higher in sensation seeking (Lin & Tsai, 2002; Müller, Dreier, Beutel & Wölfling, 2016). Given the theoretical distinction between reward drive and rash impulsiveness, we might expect differential effects on addictive behaviours. However, in these studies, it is unknown whether Internet-based behaviours reflect gambling, gaming, or social networking site use and whether highly stimulating sites were visited more frequently. It is also unknown whether the online social networking environment of Facebook provides users with similar rewarding features associated with other behavioural addictions (e.g., gambling; Internet gaming). Previous research has suggested that rash impulsiveness might be a more important predictor of Internet-based addictions than reward drive (Armstrong, Phillips & Saling, 2000; Lavin et al., 1999; Meerkerk, van den Eijnden, Franken & Garretsen, 2010). Overall, previous findings should be interpreted with caution as no studies have accounted for the potential unique contributions of rash impulsiveness and reward drive in the study of Facebook addiction. Research also points to the role of dysfunctional coping styles such as avoidance or emotion-focused coping (Higgins & Endler, 1995) as important factors in online behavioural addictions. McNicol and Thorsteinnston (2017) showed that individuals addicted to the Internet were more likely to use avoidance and emotion-focused coping styles. Błachnio, Przepiorka and Czuczwar (2017) also found that avoidance coping as well as an emotion-focused coping style were associated with higher levels of Facebook intrusion (addiction) and greater intensity of Facebook use. There is a basis for proposing that maladaptive coping styles might be mechanisms through which impulsivity influences Facebook addiction. Coping is considered an umbrella term for conscious efforts to regulate emotion, cognition, and behaviour in response to stress (Compas, Connor-Smith, Saltzman, Thomsen & Wadsworth, 2001). In this way, it involves self-reflection which is dependent on self-control resources (Ochsner & Gross, 2008). According to the differential choice model (Galla & Wood, 2015), trait self-control (i.e., low rash impulsiveness) is linked to the use of more reflective coping strategies, rather than automatic or involuntary coping. It is therefore possible that low self-control (impulsive tendencies) might be related to less reflective, and more automatic coping strategies. These strategies are likely to involve emotion-focused, avoidant, and potentially maladaptive styles. Identifying if these cognitive variables might function as modifiable factors carries implications for designing targeted interventions that could effectively prevent or treat Facebook addiction. The aim of the current research is to investigate the potential mediating role of emotion-focused and avoidance coping styles in the link between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, while controlling for reward drive in young adults. It was hypothesised that rash impulsiveness would be associated with more emotion-focused and
avoidant coping, which in turn would be associated with higher levels of Facebook addiction when controlling for reward drive. It was further predicted that rash impulsiveness, not reward drive would be positively associated with Facebook addiction based on: 1) consistent empirical evidence for an association between high rash impulsiveness and Internet-based addiction; 2) inconsistent evidence for reward drive. Reward drive-related traits have been associated with greater and lesser Internet-based addiction, possibly due to the lack of control for shared variance with rash impulsiveness. This is the first study to our knowledge that has examined maladaptive coping styles as potential mediating mechanisms of a two-factor model of impulsivity on Facebook addiction. 2. Materials and methods 2.1. Participants A total of 318 participants were recruited to the study between July and September 2018. To be eligible, participants were aged between 18 and 25 years old and had an active Facebook account. A total of 26 participants did not complete any of the survey components and 48 participants partially completed the measures. The final sample size was 244. 187 participants were undergraduate psychology students, who participated for course credit and 57 participants were recruited via convenience sampling which involved the first author (who is a student) sharing the study on his Facebook page and requesting the details be further circulated. 2.2. Measures Demographics. Participants were asked about their age, sex, living arrangements, highest level of completed education, and the amount of time per week (in hours) they spent on Facebook. Facebook addiction. Addiction to Facebook was measured using the Facebook Intrusion Questionnaire (Elphinston & Noller, 2011). This is a validated and widely used measure of Facebook addiction (Błachnio et al., 2017; Elphinston & Noller, 2011). This measure contains eight items, scored on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). Item responses are summed, with higher numbers indicating higher levels of Facebook addiction. An example item includes “I often think about Facebook when I am not using it”. This measure had good reliability, α = 0.83. Coping styles. Coping styles were measured using the emotion-focused and avoidance subscales of the Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (Endler & Parker, 1990). Each subscale contains 16 items and asks participants how often they use a particular method of coping to manage stress on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 5 = always). An example item from the emotion-focused subscale is “Get very upset", while “Go out for a snack or meal” is an example item from the avoidance subscale. Cronbach's alpha for the emotion-focused subscale was 0.90 and 0.85 for the avoidance subscale. Impulsivity traits. The impulsivity subscale from The Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory of Personality Questionnaire (Corr & Cooper, 2016) was used to measure rash impulsiveness. This measure contains eight items measured on a 4-point Likert scale (1 = not at all, 4 = highly). An example item includes “I find myself doing things on the spur of the moment”. This measure is a valid and reliable measure of impulsivity (Corr & Cooper, 2016) and was chosen for its brevity. While this scale has not been formally shown in a factor analytic study to load on a higher-order Rash Impulsiveness factor with other putative scales, its demonstrated correlations with rash impulsiveness-like traits is strongly suggestive that it would (Corr & Cooper, 2016). In this study, it had good reliability (α = 0.79). Reward drive was measured using four items from the fun seeking subscale of the Behavioural Inhibition and Behavioural Activation Survey (Carver & White, 1994). This measure is a valid and reliable measure of reward drive so long as care is taken to 2
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control for any shared variance with rash impulsiveness (Gullo et al., 2011). Participants were asked how much they agree with an item on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = none at all, 5 = very true for me). An example item includes “I crave excitement and new sensations”. This measure had good reliability (α = 0.79).
Table 1 Sample characteristics. Demographic variables Age
2.3. Procedure Participants completed the online survey using Qualtrics with informed consent provided prior to participation. The order of measures was randomised to avoid fatigue effects. Undergraduate students in the first-year participant pool received course credit for their time. Ethical clearance was obtained from The University of Queensland Human Ethics Research Committee.
Sex
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
Male Female Other Living arrangements With parents Share accommodation With a friend University accommodation Alone With a partner Other Highest level of education completed Year 10 high school Year 12 high school Diploma/certification Undergraduate degree Undergraduate degree with Honours
2.4. Data analytic plan This study used a cross-sectional design. Following data screening, frequencies, means and standard deviations were calculated for all sample characteristics and questionnaire scores. Bivariate correlations were used to assess the correlations between all variables in a preliminary analysis. A percentile bootstrapped multiple mediation model using PROCESS macro (Model 4) version 3.4 in SPSS (A. F. Hayes, 2017) was conducted to assess the mediating roles of coping styles (avoidance and emotion-focused) on the relationship between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction controlling for reward drive. Reward drive, age, sex, and time spent on Facebook were included as covariates. To examine the total, direct, and indirect effects (5000 iterations), percentile-based 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) were inspected, with estimates considered significant when the CIs do not span zero. In PROCESS, covariates entered are treated as predictors in the regression equation allowing for the total and direct effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. For indirect effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction via coping styles, the model was re-run with a common seed set for bootstrap sampling at each run included to eliminate variability associated with random sampling.
N (%) 66 38 30 36 29 21 11 13
(27%) (15.6%) (12.3%) (14.8%) (11.9% (8.6%) (4.5%) (5.3%)
81 (33.2%) 162 (66.4%) 1 (0.4%) 112 (45.9%) 45 (18.4%) 28 (11.5%) 27 (11.1%) 16 (6.6%) 10 (4.1%) 6 (2.5%) 3 (1.2%) 149 (61.1%) 33 (13.5%) 49 (20.1%) 10 (4.1%)
Note. Total N = 244.
3.3. Mediation model The potential relationships between rash impulsiveness, coping styles, and Facebook addiction, controlling for reward drive, age, sex, and time spent on Facebook were examined using a percentile bootstrapped multiple mediation analysis. Refer to Fig. 1 and Table 3 for a summary of the analysis. The results showed that there were significant direct effects of rash impulsiveness on avoidance coping (95% CI [lower limit = 0.37, upper limit = 0.92]) and emotion-focused coping styles (95% CI [lower limit = 0.33, upper limit = 0.97]). Emotion-focused coping had a direct effect on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = 0.02, upper limit = 0.20]) while avoidance coping did not have a direct significant effect on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = −0.02, upper limit = 0.19]). The findings indicated a significant indirect effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction through emotion-focused coping (95% CI [lower limit = 0.01, upper limit = 0.16]). However, there was no indirect effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction through avoidance coping (95% CI [lower limit = −0.01, upper limit = 0.13]). The direct effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction was significant (95% CI [lower limit = 0.10, upper limit = 0.57]) but the direct effect of reward drive on Facebook addiction was not significant (95% CI [lower limit = −0.53, upper limit = 0.22]). There was a significant total effect of rash impulsiveness on Facebook addiction (95% CI [lower limit = 0.24, upper limit = 0.68]). For completeness, a full summary of the direct, indirect, and total effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction via avoidance and emotion-focused coping is shown in Table 3. In short, there were no significant direct effects of reward drive on avoidance or emotion-focused coping, or significant indirect effects via avoidance or emotion-focused coping, or significant total effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction.
3. Results 3.1. Missing data analysis and sample characteristics A Missing Values Analysis indicated that 48 participants had between 6.4% and 12.4% of data missing. Little's Missing Completely at Random test showed that data was missing completely at random (χ2 = 24.81, p = 0.59), therefore listwise deletion was performed. All data met assumptions of normality and collinearity. Demographic variables are shown in Table 1. The mean age of the sample was 20.39 years (SD = 2.14). Means, standard deviations and frequencies of all variables are reported in Table 2. Mean scores on Facebook addiction were consistent with previous research (Błachnio et al., 2017; Elphinston & Noller, 2011). 3.2. Preliminary descriptive analyses Bivariate correlations were conducted between facets of impulsivity (rash impulsiveness and reward drive), coping styles (avoidance and emotion-focused), and Facebook addiction. Refer to Table 2 for a summary. Results showed that rash impulsiveness was significantly positively associated with Facebook addiction, while reward drive was not significantly correlated with Facebook addiction. Rash impulsiveness was associated with higher levels of avoidance coping and emotion-focused coping. Both avoidance and emotion-focused coping styles were significantly positively associated with Facebook addiction.
4. Discussion This research investigated the relationships between rash impulsiveness, emotion-focused and avoidant coping styles, and Facebook addiction in young people while controlling for reward drive. Results 3
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Table 2 Correlations and means of key variables. Variables
Mean
SD
Range
1
2
3
4
5
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
15.43 24.00 16.36 14.70 47.11 45.15
14.94 8.44 5.02 2.96 10.63 11.98
1–100 8–50 8–29 4–20 21–76 18–78
– 0.29*** 0.09 −0.04 0.04 0.05
– – 0.27*** 0.05 0.20*** 0.24***
– – – 0.45*** 0.35*** 0.23***
– – – – 0.24*** 0.04
– – – – – 0.34***
Average weekly Facebook use (in hours) Facebook addiction Rash impulsiveness Reward drive Avoidance coping Emotion-focused coping
Note. N = 244; ***p < 0.001. SD = Standard deviation. Table 3 Mediation analysis testing the indirect effects of rash impulsiveness and reward drive on Facebook addiction via coping styles.
Fig. 1. Mediation model. Note. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. Reward drive was treated as a predictor in the regression equation allowing for the effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. Other covariates in the model were age, sex, and time spent per week on Facebook. Unstandardized coefficients for direct paths are presented. Direct (non-significant) paths from reward drive to avoidance and emotion-focused coping were not presented for clarity. All path coefficients are presented in Table 3. Dashed lines represent non-significant associations.
Paths
Unstandardised coefficient
SE
Standardised coefficient
95% CI of unstandardised coefficient
a1 a2 a3 a4 b1 b2 c’^ c’^^ a1b1 a2b2 a3b1 a4b2 a1b1+a2b2 a3b1+a4b2 c^ c^^
0.65 0.65 0.35 −0.34 0.08 0.11 0.33 −0.16 0.05 0.07 0.03 −0.04 0.13 −0.01 0.46 −0.17
0.14 0.16 0.24 0.28 0.05 0.05 0.12 0.19 0.04 0.04 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.11 0.19
0.31 0.27 0.10 −0.08 0.10 0.16 0.20 −0.05 0.03 0.04 0.01 −0.01 0.07 −0.01 0.27 −0.06
LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL: LL:
0.37 UL: 0.92 0.33 UL: 0.97 −0.12 UL: 0.82 −0.89 UL: 0.20 −0.02 UL: 0.19 0.02 UL: 0.20 0.10 UL: 0.57 −0.53 UL: 0.22 −0.01 UL: 0.13 0.01 UL: 0.16 −0.02 UL: 0.10 −0.14 UL: 0.02 0.04 UL: 0.23 −0.14 UL: 0.09 0.24 UL: 0.68 −0.54 UL: 0.21
Note. Reward drive was treated as a predictor in the regression equation allowing for the effects of reward drive on Facebook addiction to be examined. Other covariates in the model were age, sex, and time spent per week on Facebook. CI = Confidence interval. SE = Standard error. LL = Lower limit; UL = Upper limit. c^ = total effect of rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction. c^^ = total effect of reward drive → Facebook addiction. c’^ = direct effect of rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction controlling for mediators. c’^^ = direct effect of reward drive → Facebook addiction controlling for mediators. a1 = rash impulsiveness → avoidance. a2 = rash impulsiveness → emotion-focused. a3 = reward drive → avoidance. a4 = reward drive → emotion-focused. b1 = avoidance → Facebook addiction. b2 = emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a1b1 = rash impulsiveness → avoidance → Facebook addiction. a2b2 = rash impulsiveness → emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a1b1+a2b2 = total indirect effects rash impulsiveness → Facebook addiction. a3b1 = reward drive → avoidance → Facebook addiction. a4b2 = reward drive → emotion-focused → Facebook addiction. a3b1+a4b2 = total indirect effects reward drive → Facebook addiction.
showed that emotion-focused coping significantly mediated the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction, controlling for the reward-seeking aspect of impulsivity. Rash impulsiveness was also found to be directly associated with Facebook addiction but not reward drive. Contrary to hypotheses, avoidance coping did not mediate the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. Our results add to previous studies that have shown that impulsivity is associated with substance use (Gullo et al., 2017, 2011; Stautz & Cooper, 2013; Verdejo-Garcia et al., 2008) as well as behavioural addictions (Błachnio & Przepiorka, 2016; Delaney et al., 2017; Lee et al., 2012; Ünsalver & Aktepe, 2017) and extend this previous research by showing that the rash impulsiveness dimension of impulsivity plays a unique role in Facebook addiction. Previous studies have not accounted for the dimensional components of impulsivity that might be related to Facebook addiction. Our findings support related research that points to rash impulsiveness as a more important factor than the reward drive system in online behavioural addictions (Armstrong et al., 2000; Dawe et al., 2004; Meerkerk et al., 2010). According to the dual-factor model, activation of the rash impulsiveness system is related to response disinhibition or an inability to inhibit approach tendencies. It is possible that Facebook might lack a high degree of positive reinforcement that substance use and some behavioural addictions might provide. Indeed, it could be more negatively reinforcing as there is a greater element of fear of missing out and maintenance of social relations here than in amphetamine use or gambling. Furthermore, research suggests that the independent contributions of reward drive and rash impulsivity are complex; with reward drive playing a greater role during the initial stages of addiction (Dawe et al., 2004) rather than perpetuating a downward spiral of addiction over time. We did not measure how long individuals had been using Facebook, or the trajectory towards addictive behaviours. Longitudinal research is required to
capture the independent roles of impulsivity and its facets over time and its potential causal influence on the development and maintenance of Facebook addiction. The results also show that emotion-focused coping might be an important mechanism through which rash impulsiveness is associated with Facebook addiction. It also adds to previous evidence for the role of emotion-focused coping on Facebook addiction (Błachnio et al., 2017; McNicol & Thorsteinsson, 2017). These findings are in line with theoretical models of coping, which suggest that deficits in self-control result in a reliance on automatic, maladaptive coping responses that downplay reflective capacity and an ability to regulate emotional distress (Galla & Wood, 2015). It is possible that individuals who are predisposed to rash impulsiveness may be especially vulnerable to a style of emotional coping which involves self-blame and feelings of anxiety. In this way, these individuals have a general tendency to respond to distress with more automatic emotional reactions (Galla & Wood, 2015), which can perpetuate excessive use and addictive 4
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tendencies towards Facebook. Given the high risk of substance use and mental health problems in young people (Lubman, Allen, Rogers, Cementon & Bonomo, 2007; Riggs, Baker, Mikulich, Young & Crowley, 1995), it is possible that emotion-focused coping is a shared transdiagnostic factor which could be explored further in different addiction contexts. The present findings suggested that, contrary to predictions, an avoidance coping style might not be as important as emotion-focused coping in the association between rash impulsiveness and Facebook addiction. In this study, avoidance coping was measured using the avoidance subscale of the Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (Endler & Parker, 1990), which largely reflects behavioural avoidance strategies such as social diversion rather than experiential avoidance strategies. Given that experiential avoidance is associated with addiction (S. C. Hayes, Wilson, Gifford, Follette & Strosahl, 1996), it is possible that behavioural and experiential approaches may foster different outcomes. It might also be that behavioural avoidance might not always be deleterious in all stressful situations. Future research should examine the potential moderating role of current stress and if behavioural versus experiential avoidance has specific effects on Facebook addiction. Younger people are particularly vulnerable to developing an addiction to online behaviours such as Facebook as they are prone to impulsive behaviour (Chamorro et al., 2012) due to developing brain structures (Chambers, Taylor & Potenza, 2003). The normative way in which social media has evolved as part of everyday life might also be increasing the cultural acceptability of high, intensive use (Ahn, 2011). As such, there is a significant need for early intervention as individuals move into adulthood to prevent negative trajectories of addiction and dependency. To date, there is a paucity of well-designed treatment studies targeting Internet addiction (Zajac, Ginley, Chang & Petry, 2017) and there are currently no efficacious interventions for Facebook addiction. Possible treatment targets may include practicing mindfulness to reduce rash impulsiveness, and increasing emotional awareness and problem-solving skills to reduce emotion-focused coping. It is plausible that targeting both factors could have added benefits in reducing levels of Facebook addiction; though more research is required to determine their clinical effectiveness. In this study, we measured two important dimensional constructs of impulsivity – rash impulsiveness and reward drive. Currently, pre-existing models of substance use and addiction are used to guide approaches to understanding risk factors for Facebook addiction. More research is required to elucidate the social-cognitive and neuropsychological factors such as self-efficacy, social-engagement, and expectations of Facebook use that might contribute to the maintenance of Facebook addiction. This is especially important as it has been suggested that umbrella technology-mediated behaviours such as the Internet itself are not addictive, but can act as a medium through which certain behaviours such as Facebook use might become addictive (Baggio et al., 2018). As the scientific community moves toward establishing clinical classifications of technology-based addictions, greater attention to the specific role of other media applications will be needed. Limitations of the present study should be acknowledged. A crosssectional design was used, and therefore our ability to infer causality and directionality of the relationships cannot be determined. The generalisability of these results is restricted to young people (18–25-years old). Two sampling methods were used. It is possible that sampling biases may be present based on differences in motivation to participate. While there is evidence to suggest that recruiting from online platforms such as Facebook/MTurk may be equivocal in representativeness to undergraduate samples (Briones & Benham, 2017; Shaver et al., 2019) future studies could stratify based on recruitment method. Future research should test whether the findings can generalise to adolescent samples who might be particularly vulnerable if exposed to social networking sites at a young age (Spies Shapiro & Margolin, 2014) as well as treatment-seeking individuals; though the ability to recruit
clinical samples is often challenging as few individuals are currently seeking help from specialist addiction services for online behavioural addictions. The measure of Facebook addiction used in this study was based on the components model of addiction (Griffiths, 2005) and does not reflect DSM-5 advances in the field. In addition to self-report measures, corroboration through clinical interviews could improve the comprehensiveness of assessments of Facebook addiction. 5. Conclusions This study showed that based on the dual-factor model of impulsivity, rash impulsiveness, but not reward drive was an important factor associated with Facebook addiction. Our results also provide an explanation for how rash impulsiveness conveys risk for Facebook addition through mechanisms of coping. Future treatments for Facebook addiction could be enhanced by focusing on the particular biologicallybased personality trait of rash impulsiveness as well as emotion-focused coping styles. Author disclosure statements Role of funding sources No funding sources were provided. Contributors Fowler and Elphinston designed the study and conducted the primary literature review and Gullo provided additional articles. Fowler collected and analysed data with oversight from Elphinston. Fowler and Elphinston developed the first draft of the manuscript, and all authors contributed to edits and approved the final manuscript. Declaration of Competing Interest The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. Acknowledgements MJG is supported by a Medical Research Future Fund Translating Research into Practice (TRIP) Fellowship (1167986). References Ahn, J. (2011). The effect of social network sites on adolescents' social and academic development: Current theories and controversies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 62(8), 1435–1445. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi. 21540. Andreassen, C S, Billieux, J., Griffiths, M. D., Kuss, D. J., Demetrovics, Z., Mazzoni, E., et al. (2016). The relationship between addictive use of social media and video games and symptoms of psychiatric disorders: A large-scale cross-sectional study. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 30(2), 252–262. https://doi.org/10.1037/adb0000160. Armstrong, L., Phillips, J. G., & Saling, L. L. (2000). Potential determinants of heavier internet usage. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(4), 537–550. https://doi.org/10.1006/ijhc.2000.0400. Baggio, S., Starcevic, V., Studer, J., Simon, O., Gainsbury, S. M., Gmel, G., et al. (2018). Technology-mediated addictive behaviors constitute a spectrum of related yet distinct conditions: A network perspective. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 32(5), 564–572. https://doi.org/10.1037/adb0000379. Błachnio, A., & Przepiorka, A. (2016). Dysfunction of self-regulation and self-control in Facebook addiction. Psychiatric Quarterly, 87(3), 493–500. https://doi.org/10.1007/ s11126-015-9403-1. Błachnio, A., Przepiorka, A., & Czuczwar, S. J. (2017). Type D personality, stress coping strategies and self-efficacy as predictors of Facebook intrusion. Psychiatry Research, 253, 33–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2017.03.022. Błachnio, A., Przepiorka, A., & Pantic, I. (2015). Internet use, Facebook intrusion, and depression: Results of a cross-sectional study. European Psychiatry, 30(6), 681–684. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eurpsy.2015.04.002. Briones, E. M., & Benham, G. (2017). An examination of the equivalency of self-report measures obtained from crowdsourced versus undergraduate student samples. Behavior Research Methods, 49(1), 320–334. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-0160710-8.
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