The relationship between game addiction and self-handicapping, anxiety sensitivty and alexithymia among university students

The main purpose of this research is to evaluate the relationship between levels of game addiction and self-handicapping, anxiety sensitivity, and alexithymia in university students and to determine the predictive power of these variables on game addiction. The relationship of these variables has been examined using the data obtained from a sample consisting of 144 female and 78 male participants. The Demographic Information Form prepared by the researcher, Game Addiction Scale for Adolescents, Self-Handicapping Scale, Anxiety Sensitivity Index-3 and Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20 have been given to the participants. Applying the monothetic format to the Game Addiction Scale for Adolescents, resulted in 13.5% addicted players in our sample. Findings received after statistical analyses showed that self-handicapping (low positive correlation r = .21, p < .01), anxiety sensitivity (medium positive correlation r = .32, p < .01) and alexithymia (medium positive correlation r = .34, p < .01) have a significant relationship with game addiction. The whole model consisting of self-handicapping, the cognitive, physical and social sub-dimensions of anxiety sensitivity, the identifying feelings, describing feelings and externally-oriented thinking sub-dimensions of alexithymia is found to be explaining the 19% of the variance of the variant of game addiction (F(7, 186)=6.30, p<.01). The "describing feelings" sub-dimension of alexithymia, one of de predictor variables, contribute to the model in a statistically significant (ß= .28, t=3.03, p<.01) manner. According to the results of this research, individuals facing difficulties in describing their feelings can be said to be a risk group in terms of game addiction. Keywords: Game addiction; self-handicapping; anxiety sensitivity; alexithymia