Understanding Emerging Adult Workers' Problematic Internet Use Before and During the Coronavirus Pandemic: Roles of Personality Traits, Online Activities, and Mental Health Symptoms.

The study aims to investigate patterns of relationships between emerging adult workers' personality traits, online activities, mental health symptoms, and problematic internet use (PIU) prior to and throughout the coronavirus pandemic grounded in the principles of the I-PACE model. The research analyzed pre-pandemic and mid-pandemic data from 17,475 Great British Intelligence Test emerging adult workers through state-of-the-art methods (e.g., psychological network analysis and Bayesian network modeling). Findings suggested that the overall patterns predicting PIU before and during the pandemic were different. "Neuroticism" was the central personal feature of predicting PIU in both epochs. PIU was not directly linked to any online activities but linked to "Neuroticism" via the mediation of mental health symptoms before the pandemic. However, several links from online activity (e.g., shopping, searching, and viewing films or listening to music) to PIU were positive during the pandemic. Potential practical implications related to public health issues are discussed in the study.