ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Addictive Disorders
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1682921
Assessment of Smartphone Addiction and Its Relationship with Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile and Intuitive Eating Behavior: A Cross-Sectional Study
Provisionally accepted
- Xuzhou Medical University, Xuzhou, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Background: Smartphones have become an essential part of daily life, but excessive use can lead to significant issues. This study assesses smartphone addiction among college students, examining its impact on dietary behaviors and health-promoting lifestyles. The aim is to provide a basis for targeted interventions. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 1,002 students at Xuzhou Medical University in 2025 using a convenience sampling. Data were collected via questionnaires and analyzed using SPSS 21.0. The study used the Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version (SAS-SV), the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile (HPLP-II), and the Intuitive Eating Scale-2 (IES-2). Statistical methods included normality tests, descriptive statistics, and mediation analysis. Results: Among the participants, medical students scored 34 (SAS), 74 (IES), and 134 (HPLP-II), while non-medical students scored 33.5 (SAS), 74 (IES), and 134 (HPLP-II). A negative correlation was observed between smartphone addiction and both intuitive eating (r = -0.174, p < 0.01) and health-promoting lifestyle (r = -0.074, p < 0.01). However, the effect sizes for these correlations are small, suggesting that, although statistically significant, the practical significance of these relationships may be limited. Intuitive eating mediated the relationship between smartphone addiction and health-promoting lifestyle (indirect effect = -0.1452, p < 0.001). Approximately 25.25% of participants reported feeling addicted to smartphones. Conclusion: Smartphones have dual impacts on students' eating behaviors and health. Excessive use is associated with disrupted eating patterns, while moderate use is associated with healthy behaviors that support well-being. It is crucial to educate students on balancing smartphone use with healthy habits is crucial. However, it is important to note that these findings, derived from a convenience sample at a single medical university, may not be fully generalizable to all college student populations. Future research with more diverse samples is needed to confirm these relationships.
Keywords: Smartphones, questionnaire, Cross-sectional study, Dietary behaviors, Health-promoting lifestyle
Received: 10 Aug 2025; Accepted: 22 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ding, Pei, Fang, Xiao, Yin and Sun. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Dehui Yin, yindh16@xzhmu.edu.cn
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.