Social media use can be positive for mental health and well-being
January 6, 2020— Mesfin Awoke Bekalu , research scientist in the Lee Kum Sheung Center for Health and Happiness at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, discusses a new study he co-authored on associations between social media use and mental health and well-being.
What is healthy vs. potentially problematic social media use?
Our study has brought preliminary evidence to answer this question. Using a nationally representative sample, we assessed the association of two dimensions of social media use—how much it’s routinely used and how emotionally connected users are to the platforms—with three health-related outcomes: social well-being, positive mental health, and self-rated health.
We found that routine social media use—for example, using social media as part of everyday routine and responding to content that others share—is positively associated with all three health outcomes. Emotional connection to social media—for example, checking apps excessively out of fear of missing out, being disappointed about or feeling disconnected from friends when not logged into social media—is negatively associated with all three outcomes.
In more general terms, these findings suggest that as long as we are mindful users, routine use may not in itself be a problem. Indeed, it could be beneficial.
For those with unhealthy social media use, behavioral interventions may help. For example, programs that develop “effortful control” skills—the ability to self-regulate behavior—have been widely shown to be useful in dealing with problematic Internet and social media use.
We’re used to hearing that social media use is harmful to mental health and well-being, particularly for young people. Did it surprise you to find that it can have positive effects?
The findings go against what some might expect, which is intriguing. We know that having a strong social network is associated with positive mental health and well-being. Routine social media use may compensate for diminishing face-to-face social interactions in people’s busy lives. Social media may provide individuals with a platform that overcomes barriers of distance and time, allowing them to connect and reconnect with others and thereby expand and strengthen their in-person networks and interactions. Indeed, there is some empirical evidence supporting this.
On the other hand, a growing body of research has demonstrated that social media use is negatively associated with mental health and well-being, particularly among young people—for example, it may contribute to increased risk of depression and anxiety symptoms.
Our findings suggest that the ways that people are using social media may have more of an impact on their mental health and well-being than just the frequency and duration of their use.
What disparities did you find in the ways that social media use benefits and harms certain populations? What concerns does this raise?
My co-authors Rachel McCloud , Vish Viswanath , and I found that the benefits and harms associated with social media use varied across demographic, socioeconomic, and racial population sub-groups. Specifically, while the benefits were generally associated with younger age, better education, and being white, the harms were associated with older age, less education, and being a racial minority. Indeed, these findings are consistent with the body of work on communication inequalities and health disparities that our lab, the Viswanath lab , has documented over the past 15 or so years. We know that education, income, race, and ethnicity influence people’s access to, and ability to act on, health information from media, including the Internet. The concern is that social media may perpetuate those differences.
— Amy Roeder
Social Media
Social media’s positive power for young people, social media has the promise of providing increased well-being..
Updated November 15, 2023 | Reviewed by Ray Parker
- While social media has been tied to negative outcomes for youth, new research highlights the positive.
- Despite the prevalence of social media, the fundamental need for connection among young people remains.
- Social media, when used to maintain offline connections, can foster well-being.
Thanks to my best friend (whom I met at age 13) and her incredible archival abilities, our teen years are expertly preserved like some '90s-era time capsule. Recently, she unearthed (and promptly shared on Instagram) one of our notes that I’d passed to her in eighth grade, complete with colored ink and silly drawings.
She saved most of these notes, individual sheets of notebook paper containing urgent social commentary on the happenings at J.T. Hutchinson Junior High School, expertly folded for efficient delivery into outstretched hands or locker vents. These notes were our daily lifelines to each other, serving as intentional points of connection and friendship .
Almost 30 years later, young people have traded paper and pens for notes shared via smartphones and text threads. Or Snapchat. Or Instagram. The number of delivery methods has grown exponentially since 1994.
Today’s mediums may be more sophisticated, but they help meet the same core need all teenagers possess: to feel connected to their community of friends and peers.
Much of what we understand today about young people and social media skews toward the negative. And this is necessary, as we must understand what may be harmful about these platforms.
Yet, discoveries of the negative tend to bear questions about the opposite—if we know what’s harmful, what’s helpful? Unsurprisingly, the answer lies in connection.
Springtide Research Institute’s most recent report, The State of Religion & Young People 2023: Exploring the Sacred, showed that while some young people didn’t believe sacred moments could happen online, others expressed that they could—and could be as meaningful as those offline. Young people’s descriptions of what made those moments sacred varied greatly, but the common thread was how digital interfaces allowed them to connect to someone or something important.
In this case, digital spaces acted as connective tissue between the physical, the emotional, and the metaphysical, serving as a container for young people to experience connection and the accompanying emotions—more often than not, those moments benefited their well-being.
So what if social media could be part of the wellness solution rather than the pathology problem? Current research is beginning to explore these more nuanced dissections, pointing to how social media interactions can promote positive outcomes.
- Researchers Soojung Jo and Mi Young Jang reviewed prior studies to understand how young people achieve emotional well-being via social media. They found that emotional well-being on social media is defined as,
Being happy and maintaining emotional health through relationships with others via internet-based communication platforms.
Well-being generally occurs when young people approach social media to connect with others, feel safe, or gain information. As a result, they gain better relationships with peers and more positive moods.
- Researchers Chia‑chen Yang, Sean Holden, and Jati Ariati created a framework to understand young people’s social media use concerning their psychological well-being. The model includes activities performed on social media, motives for social media use, and communication partners connected through social media.
Their model shows that:
- Social media use is associated with increased well-being when young people engage actively, directly interacting with followers with whom they have relationships, actively creating or sharing content, or using it to maintain or be entertained.
- Social media is associated with decreased well-being when young people use it to compensate for something lacking. Their use is more passive (i.e., browsing), and their communication partners are mainly those with whom they don’t have strong relationships.
Notice what lies at the core of what is associated with positive well-being instead of the negative. It’s the presence of connection versus a search to alleviate disconnection.
Those experiencing positive outcomes are interacting with people they’re close to and receiving social support based on their interactions with their content. Those experiencing negative outcomes search for connections and turn to social media to fill a void.
Even then, research shows that sometimes these young people still feel they’re falling short, whether they’re genuinely not connecting with others or the connections they are experiencing just aren’t satisfying their need for closeness.
For social media to be a conduit for positive outcomes, young people’s motivations for use matter. For them to be guided to social media for entertainment, there’s a good chance that their core needs for friendship and connection are being met elsewhere. For them to want to use social media to maintain relationships, it means those relationships were formed and solidified offline.
To make social media a place for positive outcomes, what matters most is what’s happening outside it. Social and digital spaces can’t be the only place where life, and the connection that comes with it, is happening. To ensure this technology serves as a conduit for well-being, one of the most impactful things we can do as adults is to ensure young people use it as one of many avenues for connection rather than seeking it out as the primary way to manufacture it.
Whether sheets of folded notebook paper or a series of direct message (DM) threads, young people will use what’s available to them to create meaningful connections. As adults, we must help set the conditions so social media remains a tool and doesn’t become a crutch.
Jo, S. & Jang, M.Y. (2023). Concept analysis of adolescent use of social media for emotional well-being. International Journal of Nursing Practice, 29 (1). https://doi-org.fgul.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/ijn.13116
Smith, D., Leonis, T & Anandavalli, S. (2021). Belonging and loneliness in cyberspace: impacts of social media on adolescents’ well-being, Australian Journal of Psychology , 73:1, 12-23. DOI: 10.1080/00049530.2021.1898914
Yang, C.; Holden, S. M; Ariati, J. (2021). Social media and psychological well-being among youth: The multidimensional model of social media use. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review , 24 (3), 631-650. DOI:10.1007/s10567-021-00359-z
Angela Patterson, Ph.D., is a media psychologist and head writer for Springtide Research Institute, which surveys and interviews young people on topics like mental health, technology, and spirituality.
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