The examination of sports sciences faculties students' mobile phone usage and digital game playing habits

Technology, which is rapidly insreasing in accordance with digital development such as computers and mobile devices has brought many changes in human life. Considerable changes have been observed especially in gaming habits. Games that can be played on mobile phones have started to be preferred more by users with the widespread use of smart phones which are compatible with internet usage. With this research, the frequency of mobile phone usage and playing game habits of students who have studied in the field of sports sciences were examined. This research is in a scanning model and has a descriptive quality. The target population of the study consists of students who study in Sport Sciences Faculties of Universities in Turkey in 2020-2021 academic year. The sample of the study consists of 304 students from six faculties determined by a random method among the faculties of Sport Sciences. The questionnaire form, which was categorised into four main headings as demographic characteristics of the participating students, their mobile phone status, reasons for playing games and purposes of using mobile phones, was applied in an online way. The research data was analysed on a computer by using SPSS 24.0 (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). In the analysis of the data, % and Frequency were taken, T-test and Analysis of Variance were applied. It was accepted as p<0,05 for the Significance Value. When the results of the research are examined, it was determined that 47% of the participants are women, 53% are men, 34,2% use mobile phones for 8 years or more, 35.5% spend 3-5 hours on the phone during the day, %66,4 of them play games on their mobile phones for an hour, 81,2 of them play games in the evening and at night, and they generally prefer sportive games. It was determined that the participants liked to play the game, they were happy when they were successful in the game and they wanted to play it again. They stated their thoughts about the games they played as addictive, but that did not prompt them to think that playing games is a time wasting. Moreover, it has been found out that games can be used for educational purposes and violent games can create negative effects on people. There was no significant relationship between the reasons for playing games and gender, age, department of which they studied and sports branches. It has been determined that among the participants, those who spend money on games and those who have characters in the game, play it for longer periods. There was no difference between the type of game played by the participants and their mobile phone usage purposes. There was no significant difference between the mobile phone usage purposes of the participants and gender, age, department and sports branches. When the participants' mobile phone usage purposes were exemined, it was determined that the rate of connecting to internet was high. It has been observed that there is no significant relationship between the participants' income status, mobile phone usage time, Daily mobile phone usage time, daily mobile phone usage time, daily mobile game playing time, and the time slots played during the day. In conclusion, it has been observed that the duration of digital game playing and the usage of mobile phone are high for students studying in sport branches of the universities taking place in this research. Key Words: Mobile phone, Digital Game, Student.