Negative life events and Internet addiction among Mainland Chinese teenagers and young adults: A meta-analysis

Many researchers believe Internet addiction is related to negative life events, but some scholars do not agree with this view. Therefore, we conducted a meta-analysis of 85 articles published in Chinese and English databases between 2003 and 2020, to explore the relationship between negative life events and Internet addiction among 86,833 Mainland Chinese teenagers and young adults. Results show that negative life events had a significant positive correlation with Internet addiction and that the correlation was moderated by regional location, gender, and social development. Compared with the results based on a sample of a single group, our findings are reliable and lay the foundation for further research on negative life events and Internet addiction.