The mediation role of technology addiction in the relationship between COVID-19 avoidance and social phobia

In this study, it is aimed to investigate the mediating role of technology addiction in the relationship between Covid-19 avoidance attitude and social phobia. The predictive correlational model was used as the research method. Participants in the search included 374 people, with 251 women (67.1%) and 123 men (32.9%) identified using such a convenient sampling method. The Attitudes to Avoid Covid-19 Scale, Brief Social Phobia Scale, Technology Addiction Scale and Demographic Information Form were used as data collection tools in the research. Data were collected online from December 2021 to February 2022. The Independent Groups t-Test was used in 2-groups to analyze the categorization status of the scores obtained from the scales used within the scope of the research according to the demographic variable, Pearson Correlation Analysis was used to analyze the relationships among the variables, and regression analysis based on the Bootstrap method was used to test the mediation effect. The Bootstrap method was used with 5000 resampling options in the analysis. Results showed that technology addiction has a mediating role in the relationship between Covid-19 avoidance attitude and social phobia. It was determined that there was a statistically significant difference between the variables of Covid-19 avoidance and social phobia according to gender, but no statistically significant difference between the variables of technology addiction. In terms of the variables' relationships with one another, it was found that there is a positive and significant relationship between the variables of avoidance from Covid-19 and social phobia, variables of avoidance from Covid-19 and technology addiction, and variables of technology addiction and social phobia. The results were discussed in the light of the literature, and suggestions for field experts and future studies were presented.