The relationship between smartphone addiction and shyness among medical college students

Smartphone addiction has become a widespread issue affecting the mental health of medical students. Shyness, a common personality trait, and self-acceptance have not been fully explored for their associative relationships with smartphone addiction among this population. This study aimed to explore the relationships among shyness, self-acceptance, and smartphone addiction, and to examine the mediating role of self-acceptance in these relationships. We adopted a cross-sectional survey, using the Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version, Shyness Scale, and Self-Acceptance Questionnaire, to conduct a questionnaire survey among 756 undergraduate students at a medical school in southwestern China. Results showed that shyness was significantly positively correlated with smartphone addiction ( R = 0.312, P < .001) and significantly negatively correlated with self-acceptance ( r = −0.621, P < .001). Self-acceptance was also significantly negatively correlated with smartphone addiction ( r = −0.301, P < .001). Mediation analysis indicated that self-acceptance partially mediated the relationship between shyness and smartphone addiction, accounting for 34.1% of the total effect. Shyness was associated with lower self-acceptance, which in turn was associated with a higher level of smartphone addiction.