Relationship of Internet Addiction and Mental Health of 5-6th year Students in Elementary Schools

초등학교 5.6학년 학생의 인터넷 중독과 정신건강과의 관계

The purpose of this study is to find out the relationship between internet addiction and mental health of 5-6th grade students in elementary schools and to provide some basic data to develop a program for prevention and treatment of internet addiction. The study is the research of the descriptive correlation and the subjects of the study were 643 students from 5th and 6th year children of four elementary schools in four districts which are located in G city. The data were analyzed by SAS program with frequency, percentage, means, standard deviation, x2-test, ANOVA and Pearson's Correlation Coefficient. The results were as follows: 1. In the demographic characteristics of the subjects, the boys were 50.5%, girls 49.5% and 5th grade students were 48.4%, 6th grade 51.6%. The purposes of the internet using were e-mail 40.3%, game 37.5%. 2. In the degree of the internet addiction were 4.5% of addiction, 38.7% of addiction tendency and 56.8% of non-addiction. 3. The score range of the degree of the mental health index of the subjects' were 26-28, mean 47.8. 4. There were significant differences in mental health index(F=34.01, p= .000) to the degree of the internet addiction. 5. There were significant negative correlation between the degree of internet addiction and the mertal health index(r=0.342, p= .000). The result of the study showed the students who are in high-grade in elementary school have already addicted to using of the internet as much as the youth and the more they addicted to the internet, the lower mental health index they have. According to increasing of the using internet among the elementary school students, the internet addiction of them have increased. Therefore, it is necessary to develope a program for prevention and treatment of the internet addiction.