Internet Addiction and Academic Procrastination among College Students

A Comprehensive Study

Abstract

Internet addiction has been studied globally now owing to its strong impact on the overall health of individuals in general and mental health in particular. Academicians in the world over are increasingly interested in studying the impact of internet addiction on academic procrastination, which significantly impacts the overall academic performance of students. The present study is an attempt to explore the relationship between internet addiction and academic procrastination among the degree college students of Jammu & Kashmir Union Territory. The study was conducted on a sample of 669 college students comprising of 247 male and 422 female students from Science, Mathematics and Humanities disciplines from 40 Government Degree Colleges of J&K UT. The data was collected using Internet Addiction Test, developed by Kimberly Young (1998) comprising of 20 items and Academic Procrastination Scale developed by Yockey (2016) comprising of 5 items. The study revealed that the overall prevalence of Internet addiction in the college students of J&K Union Territory is 63.22 %. A total of 4.18 % students showed Severe Internet addiction. While as 23.02 % showed moderate, while as 36.02 % showed mild levels of addiction. The female college students showed less internet addiction as compared to that of their male counterparts. The findings revealed that there was a significant difference in the internet addiction of male and female college students. While as the gender based difference was insignificant so far the academic procrastination is concerned. The study revealed that there is a significant positive correlation between internet addiction and academic procrastination with Pearson’s r = 0.325.