The Relationship between Video Games Addiction and Family Functioning, Sensation Seeking and Aggression in Students

The present study was conducted to determine the contribution of family functioning variables (problem solving، communication، role performance، emotional responsiveness، emotional intercourse، behavior control and overall functioning)، sensation seeking and aggression in the prediction of video games addiction among students. The method of this study was descriptive correlational. So، 302 high school boy students from Karaj City were selected with multi-stage sampling method and studied. Instruments of the study were family assessment device (FAD)، problem video game playing (PVP)، sensation seeking scale (SSS) and Buss & Perry aggression questionnaire. Pearson correlation and stepwise regression analysis were used for statistical analysis of the data. The results indicated that there was a significant correlation between family functioning in all dimensions (problem solving، communication، role performance، emotional responsiveness، emotional intercourse، controlling behavior and overall performance) and the video games addiction of students (r=0. 31، P<0. 01). There was a positive relationship between aggression of students and video games addiction (r=0. 47، P<0. 01). Between sensation seeking of students there was a significant positive relationship with video games addiction (r=0. 27، P<0. 01). The regression results indicated that among the investigated predictive variables، variables of aggression، role performance (a dimension of family functioning)، and sensation seeking were able to predict the video games addiction. In general، 28. 4% of the variance in video games addiction was explained with the variables.