Validation of the Internet Addiction Test (IAT) translated to Sinhala and assessing internet addiction among school children in the Western province of Sri Lanka

Abstract

Introduction and objectives Addiction to the internet is a recognized problem worldwide but has not been scientifically studied in Sri Lanka according to our knowledge. The objectives of the study were to translate Young’s Internet Addiction Test (IAT) to Sinhala and validate for use in a Sri Lankan population and to assess the prevalence of internet addiction in school children. Methods A school based cross sectional analytical study conducted in two stages among students aged 15 to 19 years. In stage 1 of the study, 200 students were administered the Sinhala translation of the IAT and internal consistency and test retest validity assessed. Once validation of the scale was established the translated scale was used on a sample of 2800 students to assess presence of internet addiction. Results The Sinhala translation of the Internet addiction test showed good reliability with a Chrohnbach’s alpha value of 0.78 and good validity with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.85. 8% of the entire study sample and 12.6% among those using the internet showed features of internet addiction. The majority of cases of internet addiction identified were mild 8.2% followed by moderate internet addiction in 3.6% and only 0.9 % having severe internet addiction. Conclusions This study demonstrated that the Sinhala translation of Young’s IAT is suitable to assess internet addiction in Sri Lanka. It also identified that there are students in Sri Lanka who are addicted to the internet. More studies are required to identify characteristics of those who are addicted to the internet and to plan interventions.