Mobile Phone Addiction among Tehrani Youths: A Sociological Study

K. Mousavi & Y. Shafigh

Abstract
Nowadays, the problem of dependence on the new technologies or addiction to them is considered as a modern addiction among youths. In the present article, we examine the youths addiction to mobile phone and its influential factors. In the theoretical framework, we used Rokeach and Melvin DeFleur’s media dependency theory, the theory of John M. Grohol and theory of Hooper and P Zhou. Our research population included all Tehrani youths aged between 15-30 years olds in 2014 and 400 youths were selected as the research sample. It should be mentioned that the research sample was primarily determined by applying Cochran's sample size formula, and then the respondents were selected using the cluster sampling method. Moreover, in order to measure the rate of addiction to the mobile phone, we employed Mrino Cholize's standard scale (TMD-2013). The finding showed that youths' addiction to mobile was of average rate- neither so high nor so low. Besides, the independent variables such as social, economic, and cultural capitals demonstrated significant relation with addiction to the mobile phone. In addition, there is a relatively strong relationship between peer groups' effect and the mobile phone addiction with the rate of youths' addiction to the mobile phone, but there is no any significant relation between religiosity rate and mobile phone addiction. In sum, the independent variables explained 49 percent of addiction to the mobile phone variance.
Keyconcepts: mobile phone addiction, cyber addiction, mobile phone dependence, cultural and social capitals, extra communications function of mobile

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