Through a Public Health Lens: Association of Problematic Internet Use (PIU) and Related Factors among Adolescents in Dhaka City, Bangladesh.

The study aims to identify predictors of Problematic internet use (PIU) among Bangladeshi adolescent samples based on a public health model. This cross-sectional study was conducted in a sample of 268 college students selected from two colleges in Dhaka city, Bangladesh, selected by convenience sampling technique. Each participant who has given written consent responded to a pretested self-administered questionnaire. PIU was assessed by the Bangla version of Young's Internet Addiction Test scale and depression was assessed using the Bangla version of the Patient Health Questionnaire. The results indicated that 96.0% of the respondents used the internet and 24.4% identified as problematic users. The study analyzed psychological factors, family, school factors and environmental factors. The study analyzed accessibility and availability of the internet as environmental factors. Logistic regression showed that depression odds ratio (OR) = 4.70 was identified as increasing the odds of PIU. No family and school factors found significantly associated with internet use. Among Internet use behavior, a high perception of internet use for social networking (OR = 3.72) and relieving loneliness (OR = 3.70) increased the odds of PIU as well as internet use for getting information and news (OR = 0.41) decreased the odds of PIU. Primary prevention-based interventions are to be designed to prevent PIU considering it a public health problem.