Addressing Adolescent Internet Addiction: The Roles of School Disconnectedness, Deprivation, and Resilience

A large cross-sectional study of 2,485 adolescents found that school disconnectedness is associated with higher levels of problematic internet use.

In this cross-sectional sample, school-climate measures correlated with problematic internet use. Standardized associations were approximately β = 0.36 for disconnectedness.

Social-cognitive mechanisms offer a plausible explanatory framework: perceived social disadvantage was associated with compensatory online behavior in cross-sectional mediation analyses.

Adversity beliefs moderated outcomes in the study’s cross-sectional analyses—stronger adversity beliefs were associated with weaker links between relative deprivation, disconnectedness, and problematic internet behaviors, implying resilience factors can buffer risk.

Clinically, these data suggest assessing school connectedness may help identify adolescents at elevated risk for internet-related behavioral problems, though prospective and implementation studies are needed.