Fear of COVID-19, depression, anxiety, and their association with Internet addiction disorder in a sample of Italian students

Abstract

Background: The 2019 Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has led to a worldwide lockdown which has obliged people to stay confined at home, often resulting in social distancing measures and isolation, which can lead to mental health problems as well as to specific Internet-use disorders. This study aims to investigate fear of COVID-19, anxiety, and depression symptoms, and their impact on Internet addiction disorder, modeled as intrapersonal conflicts and interpersonal conflicts, during the COVID-19 epidemic. Method: An online questionnaire was administered to 454 Italian students during the first national lockdown. All the recruited participants completed measures including the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress (DASS-21 ), Fear of COVID-19, and Internet addiction . Results: The results of the present study demonstrated that fear of COVID-19 was associated with Internet addiction disorder, and fear of COVID-19 mediated the relationship between anxiety and Internet addiction disorder. Finally, controlling for covariates (age and gender), fear of COVID-19 was linked to Internet addiction disorder. Limitations: Limitations include the cross-sectional research design and reliance on data exclusively from Italy. Conclusions: Results are discussed in the framework of the Interaction-Person-Affect-Cognition-Execution (I-PACE) conceptualization of affective and cognitive responses as strategies for explicating the psycho-pathology of excessive Internet use.

Keywords

• Internet addiction disorder
• COVID-19
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Pandemics