Can Psychologists Identify When the Problem is Cybersex Addiction?: An Exploratory Study

• Author / Creator

  Yassa, Easter Samir

• Clients with cybersex addiction (CSA) are a growing challenge for mental health practitioners. Therapists must be more skilled and adept at identifying when the core issue is cybersex addiction in spite of client denial and potentially confounding symptoms. The main purpose of this exploratory research was to determine whether psychologists can identify when the presenting problem is cybersex addiction among non-disclosing clients. A pilot was conducted with 10 doctoral-level graduate students in psychology and three Expert Validators to evaluate the construct validity and internal reliability of the Client Vignette Scoring Instrument (CVSI) created for this study. The CVSI provided participants with three fictional case vignettes which each incorporated a specific number of CSA criteria. The case of “Jeff” included no CSA symptoms, “Sophie” included the minimum required for diagnosis, and “Bill” included the maximum. Psychologists were then recruited via the CPA and the PAA online and by mail, resulting in a final sample of 93 participants. Three surveys were administered: the CVSI, a Modified Sexual Opinion Survey-Revised (SOS-R-M), and a demographic survey. Alpha was set at .10. Results of a chi-square test for goodness of fit indicated that a significant proportion of psychologists missed correctly identifying CSA as the primary presenting problem in the case of both Sophie and Bill, but correctly avoided identifying CSA as the primary presenting problem in the case of Jeff. Results of a multiple linear regression found no significant predictive model in any of the three cases for the IVs age, number of years in practice, Internet familiarity, sexual attitude and amount of training in CSA/SA on the outcome variable perception of CSA symptoms. Neither age, sexual attitude, gender, nor province of registration had a significant effect on perception of CSA symptoms in any of the cases. Doctoral level psychologists had significantly lower scores on the outcome variable than Master's level in all cases. Implications of the findings are discussed.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Diagnosis
  • Mental health professionals
  • Sexual Opinion Survey
  • Psychologists
  • Sex addiction
  • Cybersex addiction

• Graduation date

  Spring 2014

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3CV4C099

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.