Personality Traits: Facebook Addiction among Teenagers and Young Adults

Abstract

Some personality traits have tendencies to lead the commonly Facebook usage toward Facebook addiction. The present study aimed to investigate the relationship of particular Big Five Personality traits as well as predicting those traits with Facebook addiction. This study has also evaluated the differences of Facebook addiction in terms of age between teenager and young adult students. An initial purposive sample of 300 Facebook users was selected from various schools and colleges. The sample consisted of 150 teenager students (75 teenager girls, 75 teenager boys) and 150 young adult students (75 young adult girls, 75 young adult boys) as total sample of 300 Facebook users. From this sample of 300 Facebook users, 86 participants were indicated as Facebook addicts while the remaining 214 participants were not Facebook addicts as assessed by the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale (Andreassen et. al., 2012). The Big Five Markers Personality Scale (Goldberg, 1992) and Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale were used as assessment measures. Pearson product moment correlation, linear regression and independent sample t-test were used to find out the results. The results indicated significant positive relationship of extraversion and significant negative relationship of conscientiousness with Facebook addiction. Extraversion personality trait positively predicted Facebook addiction while conscientiousness personality trait negatively predicted Facebook addiction. Agreeableness, Emotional Stability and Intellect personality traits were insignificant for Facebook addiction. Additionally, insignificant differences were revealed between Facebook addicted teenagers and young adults. The study would be an addition to the academic literature on personality and social psychology, and better understanding of Facebook addicted teenagers and young adults for counseling and psychotherapy.