A Study Of The Relationship Between Pathological Internet Use And Information Poverty

Information poverty is a new form of poverty, people tend to pay attention only to the economic poverty and ignore information poverty, and pathological internet use has become an important factor influencing on adolescent life and study, even lead to juvenile crime. As a state-level poverty county, poverty widely exists in the economic field of Du’an, and spreads in the field of information dissemination. At the same time, the secondary school students in Du’an and the college students origined from Du’an, their network usage behavior make it even more worrisome. This paper tries to analysis the relation between the pathological internet use and the information poverty from the angle of sociology, psychology and communication.According to different dimensions involving material access、five communication models and the degrees of information possessed, develop instrument to assess the level of middle school students’information gained; Assimilate the researches on pathological internet use in borne and abroad, measures the degree of pathological internet use based on the Kimberly. S. Young’s7criterions of internet addiction disorder. A total of317students from different middle school in Du’an were tested with theses two scales.The findings suggest that:1.Information poverty becomes a serious problem among the middle school students of Du’an, and they have a higher rate of pathological internet use than students in the other area.2. Accommodation has significant effect on student’s information level and their internet dependence severity: students who live off campus take possession of higher information level and more rational internet behavior.3. Gender is not affecting the students’level of information but it making influence on their pathological internet use:Boys are more prone to internet addiction than girls, but girls show more addictive tendency.4. Students in different school type gained different information level and different internet dependence severity:vocational secondary school students are more prone to internet addiction than other students with lower information level.5. Middle school students’ academic ranking have a lot going for their information level and internet dependence severity:Better ranking lead to higher information level and more rational internet behavior.6. There is a causality relationship between information level and internet dependence severity, poor information level can easily lead to pathological internet use, and keep a sustained influence.