EVALUATION OF THE RELATION BETWEEN HEALTH LITERACY AND INTERNET ADDICTION: A STUDY IN ANKARA

Abstract

This research was designed as a descriptive study to examine whether there is a relationship between internet addiction and health literacy. In addition, measuring the internet addiction and health literacy levels of the participants with the research, and determining whether there is a difference between these levels according to their demographic characteristics such as age, gender, education, income, marital status, and their perceived health level and their use of health services were determined as the other objectives of the research. A questionnaire consisting of three parts was used as a data collection tool in the research. In the first part of the questionnaire, there are questions about the demographic characteristics of the participants, and in the other two parts, the Turkish Health Literacy Scale and the Internet Addiction Scales take place. In the study, 358 people were sampled by using convenience sampling method. Non-parametric methods were used in the analysis of the data, since the participants' internet addiction and health literacy scores (P≤0.05) did not show a normal distribution. Percentage, frequency distributions, mean scores, standard deviation and median are given as descriptive statistics. The comparison of categorical variables on the basis of groups was made using Chi-square and Fisher's Exact tests. The Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare paired groups, and the Kruskal Wallis test was used to compare groups with three or more variables. The relationship between health literacy and internet addiction was examined using Spearman’s rho Correlation analysis. Cronbach's Alpha coefficient was calculated for the measurement of scale reliability. P<0.05 was considered statistically significant. As a result, it was determined that the participants in the study got an average of 37.46±10.56 points from the internet addiction scale and 32.28±8.74 points from the health literacy scale. No relationship was found between the participants' internet addiction and health literacy scores (r=-0.10, p=0.845).