Association Between Smartphone Usage, Quality of Life, and Sleep Duration Among University Students
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Background: Problematic smartphone use and sleep disturbance may adversely affect university students’ well-being, but evidence examining these factors concurrently in Pakistani students remains limited. Objective: To determine the associations among smartphone use, quality of life, and sleep-related outcomes in university students in Lahore, Pakistan. Methods: This analytical cross-sectional study included 218 students recruited through convenience sampling from three universities. Smartphone use, quality of life, and sleep were assessed using the Smartphone Addiction Scale–Short Version, World Health Organization Quality of Life–Brief Version, and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, respectively. Descriptive statistics and Spearman’s rank correlations were calculated. Results: Most participants were aged 22–24 years (59.6%), and smartphone-use categories were broadly distributed across low, moderate, high, and very high levels. Overall quality of life was rated as good or very good by 172 participants (78.9%), while 158 (72.5%) reported very good or fairly good subjective sleep quality. Smartphone-use scores were weakly and inversely associated with quality-of-life scores (ρ = −0.151, p = 0.026) but were not associated with sleep-quality scores (ρ = 0.056, p = 0.410). Poorer sleep quality was associated with lower quality of life (ρ = −0.216, p = 0.001). Conclusion: Greater smartphone use was weakly associated with poorer quality of life, while sleep quality showed no significant association with smartphone use. Sleep remained significantly related to overall well-being
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