A Cross-Sectional Study to Assess the Impact of Smartphone Use on Daily Activities of Living Among Undergraduate Students in a Selected College in Bangalore

Abstract

Introduction: Smartphones are compact devices which are commonly used by undergraduate students. Nowadays it is evident that around 4.76 h are spent by the students for entertainment and are at risk of addiction and have impact in terms of academic, physical, social, economic, psychological and behavioral activities on daily basis.

Aim: The aim of the study was to assess the impact of smartphone use on daily activities of living among undergraduate students.

Methodology: The study employed a non-experimental, cross sectional research design with the quantitative approach, using randomized purposive sampling technique. A total of 318 nursing students were chosen. The data collection tool consisted of two parts: (1) Baseline variables, and (2) Smartphone impact tool for assessing the impact of smartphones on daily activities. The smartphone impact tool had content validity of 0.7, parallel-form reliability with WHOQL-BREF r value 0.892.

Results: The smartphone use had moderate impact on physical, psychological, social, academic domain with the means of 19.9±5, 28.1±6.2, 11.4±3.3, and 22.5±5.2 respectively. However, there was a mild impact on Economic domain with mean of 14±4. The overall impact of smartphone uses on daily activities among undergraduate students had moderate level of impact with mean value of 111.34±24.6.

Conclusion: Undergraduate students are more prevalent to use smartphone, as access is very easy. There is moderate risk of having the impact of smartphone use on their daily activities. The administrators of education and service need to provide adequate guidance regarding the impact of smartphone use.