Distinguishing Different Types of Mobile Phone Addiction:
Development and Validation of the Mobile Phone Addiction
Type Scale (MPATS) in Adolescents and Young Adults
Qing-Qi Liu 1,2 , Xiao-Pan Xu 3,*, Xiu-Juan Yang 4, Jie Xiong 5 and
Yu-Ting Hu 6
1 College of Education for the Future, Beijing Normal University at Zhuhai, Zhuhai 519087, China;liuqingqi@bnu.edu.cn
2 School of Education, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou 510006, China
3 Institute for Public Policy and Social Management Innovation, College of Political Science and Public Administration, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang 453007, China
4 School of Psychology, Central China Normal University, Wuhan 430079, China; yxjccnupsy@126.com
5 Center for Mental Health, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430063, China; jessiexx@whut.edu.cn
6 School of Business, Jiangnan University, Wuxi 214122, China; hytpsy@yeah.net
* Correspondence: xuxiaopank@163.com
Abstract: Researchers have developed various versions of scales to measure mobile phone addiction.Existing scales, however, focus primarily on the overall level of mobile phone addiction but do not distinguish the potential differences between different types of mobile phone addiction. There is a lack of established scales that can measure different types of mobile phone addiction. The present study aimed to uncover the specific types of mobile phone addiction and develop a Mobile Phone Addiction Type Scale (MPATS) for adolescents and young adults. Adolescents and young adults from two high schools and two universities in Central and South China participated in our study. A total of 108 mobile phone addicts (Mage = 17.60 years, SD = 3.568 years; 60.185% males) were interviewed to uncover the specific types of mobile phone addiction. Data from 876 adolescents and young adults (Mage = 16.750 years, SD = 3.159 years; 49.087% males) were tested for item discrimination and exploratory factor analysis. Data from 854 adolescents and young adults (Mage = 16.750 years,SD = 3.098 years; 50.820% males) were analyzed for construct validity, convergent validity, criterionrelated validity, and internal consistency reliability. The 26-item Mobile Phone Addiction Type Scale (MPATS) was developed with four factors named mobile social networking addiction, mobile game addiction, mobile information acquisition addiction, and mobile short-form video addiction. The four-factor, 26-item MPATS revealed good construct validity, convergent validity, criterion-related validity, and internal consistency reliability. The new scale is suitable for measuring different types of mobile phone addiction in adolescents and young adults. Limitations and implications are discussed.
Keywords: mobile phone addiction type; validity; reliability; adolescents; young adults
（政治与公共管理学院 李广宇）
