Influence of smartphone addiction proneness of young children on problematic behaviors and emotional intelligence: Mediating self-assessment effects of parents using smartphones

In this study, we verified the effects of smartphone addiction proneness of young children (ages one to six) on problematic behaviors and emotional intelligence. We investigated whether parental self-assessment of smartphone usage affects the way in which children's smartphone addiction impacts their behaviors and emotional intelligence. Smartphone addiction proneness sub-factors interfere with daily life and compulsory control through voluntary isolation and personality distortion. Differences exist in daily-life interference according to parental ages, voluntary isolation according to parental occupations, and personality distortion according to parental academic backgrounds. Among attributes of young children's smartphone usage, differences exist in compulsory control needs and personality distortion starting from a young age, and compulsory control needs according to the child's daily smartphone usage. Moreover, no correlations exist between independent variables of daily-life interference and the emotional intelligence outcome variable. All addictive tendencies have significant positive effects on problematic behaviors, and significant negative effects on emotional intelligence. The greater the degree to which parents are self-evaluative of their smartphone usage, the lower is the influence of children's smartphone addiction proneness on their problematic behaviors. This study suggests that parents' self-reflective attitude towards smartphone usage can undermine the negative effects of smartphone overuse by young children.