Is Smartphone Usage Truly Smart? A Qualitative Investigation of IT Addictive Behaviors

Abstract

Defined as the dependency to a technology that results in its excessive and compulsive use, IT addiction is seen as increasingly prevalent in today's societies. Recent research has revealed that IT addictive behaviors are creating serious problems for individuals and organizations alike. In this paper, we report the results of a qualitative study that aimed at investigating smart phone addictive usage. Building on 11 in-depth interviews and answers to 183 exploratory written questionnaires, we used a grounded theory approach to investigate this phenomenon. Our results reveal four smarphone user profiles. In two of these profiles, users are exhibiting addictive behaviors. In the first group, the users' profile corresponds to that of other types of additions. In the second group, known definitions of addiction do not apply and the characteristics of these users are very different. Our results thus suggest that adopting traditional conceptualizations of addiction will not be sufficient to define, understand and manage IT addictive behaviors.