INVESTIGATION OF PROBLEMATIC INTERNET USE ACCORDING TO COGNITIVE FLEXIBILTY LEVELS OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS
The aim of this research is to study whether problematic internet use and excessive internet usage, social benefit-social comfort and subdimensions comprised from negative results of internet differ meaningfully regarding cognitive flexibility and gender variables. 1642 students (830 male and 812 female) having education in boarding and day secondary education institutions in Adana city central districts and selected with random cluster sampling method make up the sample of this research. In this research, “Cognitive Flexibility Scale” was used to determine the cognitive flexibility levels of high school students, and “Problematic Internet Use – Adolescence” was used to determine their problematic internet usages. The study was made in correlational survey model. In data analysis, two-way variant analysis (ANOVA) method was used to determine whether the difference between variables is meaningful, and LSD test was used to test the source of differences. Meaningfulness level was accepted as .05. According to the result of statistical analysis obtained, problematic internet uses, negative results of internet, social benefit-social comfort and excessive internet uses decrease as cognitive flexibility level of high school students increase. Although problematic internet uses and negative results of internet do not differ regarding gender, social benefit-social comfort differ in favor of males, and excessive usage differ in favor of females. In accordance with the findings obtained from this study, group studies to avoid and decrease problematic internet usage are suggested. Furthermore, psychoeducational studies to increase cognitive flexibility level can also be conducted.

Keywords
Problematic Internet Use, Cognitive Flexibility, High School Students