Examination of middle school students' digital game addiction levels in terms of parents' digital parenting self-efficacy

The purpose of this study is to examine middle school students' digital game addiction and their parents' digital parental self-efficacy skills in terms of various variables and to analyze the relationship between students' digital game addiction and their parents' digital parental self-efficacy. Relational survey model, one of the quantitative research approaches, was used in the study. The student study group consisted of 1131 (47.3%) girls and 1257 (52.7%) boys, totaling 2388 secondary school students; the parent study group consisted of 293 (66.1%) mothers and 150 (33.9%) fathers, totaling 443 parents. The demographic information of the participants was obtained with the Personal Information Form prepared by the researcher. The digital game addiction data of the study were collected with the Digital Game Addiction Scale for Children developed by Hazar and Hazar in 2017. The digital parent self-efficacy data of the study were collected with the Digital Parenting Self-Efficacy Scale developed by Yaman in 2018. The data were analyzed using frequency analysis, t test, ANOVA test and Pearson correlation analysis. According to the findings of the study, digital game addiction in children differs according to gender, school type, daily play time and the tool used while playing games. In the context of digital parental self-efficacy, parental gender, age and daily internet usage time variables affect parents' digital self-efficacy. Finally, a statistically significant, negative and weak relationship was observed between digital self-efficacy in parents and digital game addiction in children.