Chapter 3. Design of an instrument to determine the prevalence of social media addiction

In recent years, concerns have increasingly centered on social media addiction due to its negative impact on mental health. This research focuses on developing, creating, and validating a tool to identify key factors associated with addictive behavior in university students' use of social media. The study involved a sample of 111 students, utilizing a 34-item questionnaire that assessed factors associated with social media addiction, organized into three categories and seven subcategories. The instrument demonstrated high reliability (α = .981), statistically significant coefficients, and an exploratory factor analysis explaining 75.42% of the variability in the instrument. In conclusion, it was found that family dysfunction, a lack of family cohesion, and academic procrastination significantly increase the likelihood of developing addictive behaviors toward social media among university students