Relationship Between the Early Maladaptive Schema and Social Networks Addiction Among Semnan University of Medical Sciences Students

 Early maladaptive schemas are self-destructive emotional and cognitive patterns that have been formed at the beginning of development and are repeated in life. Since early maladaptive schemas can be the most predictive of addiction and social networking addiction is also considered as an injury or complication. This study aimed to determine the relationship between early maladaptive schemas and social network addiction among students.

 This cross-sectional study was performed on 350 students of Semnan University of Medical Sciences. In this study, Yang’s Short Form Questionnaire and the questionnaire of social network s addiction based on mobile were used. Data were analyzed by the Chi-square test and logistic regression.

 There were 186 (53.2%) students who had social network addiction. Of them, 215 (61.4%) had at least one early maladaptive schema. The gender of the woman (OR=0.35, P=0.021), age over 21 years (OR=0.56, P<0.001), the formation of the schema of recognition (OR=0.54, P=0.01) and the formation of the schema entitlement (OR=0.47, P=0.002) with the reduction and the formation of the schema of social isolation / emotional inhibition (OR=2.94, P=0.006) was accompanied with increasing of the chance of being addicted to social networks.

 The results showed that some of the individual characteristics and the formation of some of the schemas are associated with decreasing and increasing the chance of addiction to social networks.