High school students' social media use predicts school engagement and burnout: the moderating role of social media self-control.

Youth Social Media Use and Health Outcomes: #diggingdeeper

Prior work on the relationship between general social media use and political knowledge has yielded mixed findings. One recent meta-analysis on the topic concluded that the literature, when assessed as a whole, fails to indicate a direct and statistically identifiable between relationship general social media use and political knowledge. Considering these findings, the present work sought to assess the extent to which general social media use might be conditionally related to political knowledge. To do so, we explored the moderating effect of information-related self-efficacy beliefs. Specifically, building upon general self-efficacy theory and the idea that there exists considerable concern over the extent to which information on social media is factually incorrect, misleading, or biased, we predicted that mis and disinformation self-efficacy (MDSE) beliefs would positively condition the relationship between general social media usage and political knowledge. Contrary to our expectations, the results of three studies indicated that the combination of MDSE and frequent social media use was negatively related to political knowledge.

Purpose: Our purpose was to describe the social media platforms and experiences of adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer patients and caregivers. We aimed to identify the general social media use of this group in order to determine the information seeking and sharing behaviors within the AYA cancer experience. Methods: From March 2021 to July 2021, we recruited participants through online repositories (e.g., ResearchMatch), and posted flyers on social media and at a large adolescent and young adult (AYA) conference. Eligible participants included 1) cancer patients who were between the ages of 18-39 and were diagnosed within this age range, use social media weekly, and speaks English and 2) informal cancer caregivers between the ages of 18-39, use social media weekly, and speaks English. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with participants over the telephone. We summarized sociodemographic and cancer factors, then categorized qualitative and quantitative data about general social media usage into platform use, differences between platform experiences, and information found. Results: There were 50 participants who completed an online screening form regarding social media platform usage, 17 of whom completed the study (36.0% participation rate). Of the 17 participants, Facebook (88.2%), Instagram (82.3%), and Twitter (76.5%) were the most common social media platforms used. Participants described that when using social media during cancer their preferred platforms were Facebook and Instagram, respectively, because of their ease of use and accessibility. This allowed a large population of cancer patients to be active on these platforms. Facebook was used most frequently for finding support through “groups”, from which participants could seek advice, anecdotes, or support from other cancer patients. On Instagram, participants most often interacted with cancer information through cancer specific pages like “Stupid Cancer” or “The Cancer Patient”. These pages target the adolescent-young adult age group. Participants felt as if the aspect of humor, the sharing of survival stories, research findings and opportunities, and fellow cancer survivors within the comments or through direct messages helped support them. The anecdotes/stories that were shared on social media often detailed a patient's treatment regimen, survivorship, and daily life, which helped patients and caregivers analyze their own cancer experiences and routines. Conclusions: Adolescents and young adults are diagnosed at a developmentally unique time in life, where they may seek support and comfort through social media platforms. By studying the types of platforms used, the reasons for using social media, and patterns of social media use this work provides a foundation for targeting AYA cancer patients and caregivers for social media interventions. Citation Format: Keely K. Smith, Ashley Green, Jennifer Traslavina Jimenez, Terry Badger, Echo L. Warner. General social media use amongst young adult cancer patients and caregivers [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Virtual Conference: 14th AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2021 Oct 6-8. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2022;31(1 Suppl):Abstract nr PO-019.

Background: Social media use has grown rapidly and has been integrated into the lives of many adolescents and young adults worldwide. Research indicates that excessive social media engagement can negatively impact sleep quality through various mechanisms. Objective: This scoping review of reviews aims to explore the relationship between social media use and sleep quality among adolescents and young adults, synthesize existing evidence, identify research gaps, and highlight directions for future research. Methods: Arksey’s and O’Malley’s five-stage framework was used to conduct this scoping review. Searches were conducted in PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, Medline, and Scopus for articles published between 2020 and 2025. The inclusion criteria were systematic reviews or meta-analyses focused on adolescents and young adults, examining social media use in relation to sleep quality, and peer-reviewed articles written in English. Ten articles met all eligibility criteria and were included in the review. Results: The findings indicate a small but consistent negative effect of social media use on sleep quality. Problematic social media use showed a stronger association with poorer sleep than general social media use. Specific platforms such as Facebook and Twitter contributed most to shorter sleep duration, later bedtimes, and poorer sleep quality, while Snapchat and Instagram showed moderate effects, and WhatsApp and WeChat showed smaller effects. Conclusions: Problematic social media use is strongly associated with poorer sleep quality, while general use may have smaller effects. Future research focusing on longitudinal studies would help deepen the understanding of the effects of social media on sleep and guide targeted interventions. Encouraging responsible or healthy social media use is vital in reducing the risks of problematic use while highlighting the benefits as well.

Background Globally, alcohol use significantly contributes to the disease burden. Alcohol consumption in Uganda is related to several health consequences among young people, including university students. Social media is commonly used by students to share academic information and create social networks. Among young people in high-income countries, previous studies have also shown that social media use can have negative health outcomes related to alcohol use, and associated problems. To date, similar studies conducted in low- and middle-income countries are largely missing. Objective To assess the prevalence of and associations between social media use and alcohol consumption among university students in Uganda. Method This was a cross-sectional study among 996 undergraduate students at Makerere University. Data were collected using a questionnaire. Alcohol use in the previous 12 months was the dependent variable. The independent variable was social media use categorised as general use, alcohol-related use, and social media lurking/passive participation. Multinomial logistic regression was used to assess associations. Crude and adjusted odds ratios were reported. Results Nearly all students (97%) used social media and 39% reported alcohol use. Regular alcohol use was significantly associated with moderate (OR = 2.22, CI: 1.35–3.66) and high level general social media use (OR = 2.45, CI: 1.43–4.20). Regular alcohol use was also associated with alcohol-related social media (OR = 6.46, CI: 4.04–10.30), and alcohol-related lurking (OR = 4.59, CI: 2.84–7.39). Similar, although weaker associations were identified for occasional alcohol use. Conclusions Approximately four in ten students reported alcohol use in the past year, and almost all students used social media. Alcohol-related social media use was associated with occasional and regular alcohol use, with stronger associations for regular use. These findings may guide further research and present an opportunity for potential alcohol control interventions to improve health among young populations in low- and middle-income countries.

Health-related services shared through social media are enjoying considerable growth, particularly among young people, yet they have potentially detrimental outcomes for consumer well-being. This research undertakes an examination of literature pertaining to health-related social media use in an effort to explore its relationship with disordered eating in particular. In line with objectification theory, Study 1 affirms that viewing images and videos posted on health-related social media is positively associated with the level of people’s disordered eating. Furthermore, Study 2 clarifies that this relationship is mediated, as expected, by social physique anxiety, and it also is unexpectedly moderated by general social media use. That is, the relationship between viewing health-related images and videos and disordered eating is stronger among consumers who exhibit low and medium social media use rather than those with high social media use. The implications of these findings are relevant for both health-related service research and public policy.

Risky selfies are recent, but worrying phenomena in which adolescents take pictures of themselves during the act of risk behavior. By applying the principles of the prototype willingness model, the current cross-sectional study among adolescents ( N = 686) aged 15–18 years old examined the relation between social media use and adolescents’ risky selfie behavior. A structural equation modeling indicated that adolescents’ general social media use was positively related to descriptive norm estimations of risky selfie takers and favorable prototype perceptions of risky selfie takers. Moreover, attitudes toward the taking of risky selfies and prototype perceptions of risky selfie takers were found to positively relate to adolescents’ willingness to engage in risky selfie taking and their actual risky selfie behavior. Furthermore, no support was found for the moderating roles of gender, developmental status, narcissism, and sensation seeking in the reported relations with social media use.

Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) content is popular on social media, and social media is commonly used by college students to seek out ADHD information. This study aimed to characterize how college students with ADHD symptoms yet no ADHD diagnosis engage with ADHD digital media and investigate the relationship between ADHD digital media use, ADHD symptoms, and ADHD stigma. 490 college students who reported current ADHD symptoms yet denied an ADHD diagnosis (M age = 19.09) completed cross-sectional self-report measures of social media use, ADHD digital media use, ADHD symptoms, and ADHD stigma. Most participants reported daily engagement with ADHD digital media. 68.2% of participants reported watching social media video clips featuring people or characters with ADHD daily, which was the most common form of ADHD digital media use. General social media use (β = .135) and ADHD digital media use (β = .160) were significantly and positively associated with ADHD symptoms, but neither were associated significantly with ADHD stigma. Total social media use was not significantly correlated with ADHD digital media use (r = .036). Exposure to ADHD content online is common among college students who report ADHD symptoms. As the internet continues to be inundated with ADHD content, future research should consider how ADHD digital media use is associated with college students’ perceptions of their ADHD symptoms. Further research clarifying the likely bidirectional relationship between ADHD symptoms and exposure to ADHD digital media is warranted.

Navigating Social Media in #Ophthalmology

Objective: Alcohol marketers have increasingly moved their advertising efforts into digital and social media venues. As a result, the purpose of this study is to investigate associations between students’ use of social media, their exposure to alcohol marketing messages through social media, and their alcohol-related beliefs and behaviors. Participants: Public and private university students (N = 637) participated November and December 2011 and April 2012. Methods: College students completed online surveys to measure their exposure to social and online media generally, as well as their alcohol-related digital media use and alcohol use. Results: Use of social media related to alcohol marketing predicted alcohol consumption and engaging in risky behaviors, whereas the use of social media more generally did not. Conclusions: Students’ use of alcohol-related social media–marketing content associates with their problem drinking. Results have implications for alcohol abuse reduction efforts targeted at college students and suggest the importance of considering social, cultural, and cognitive factors in campaign planning and design.

Although research findings highlight the complex dualities of the Strong Black Woman ideal and demonstrate its effects on Black women’s mental health and well-being, there is less understanding of the role that social media may play in Black women’s negotiation of this ideal. To what extent might Black women’s engagement with race-related social media, such as the use of Black-oriented blogs and hashtags, contribute to their well-being and potentially buffer contributions of the Strong Black Woman ideal? To investigate this question, we tested 412 Black women who completed online survey measures assessing their general social media use, Black-oriented blog and hashtag use, mental health, and self-esteem. Correlational and regression analyses revealed that, as expected, both greater endorsement of the Strong Black Woman ideal and higher levels of general social media use was associated with adverse mental health and lower self-esteem. Contrary to our expectations, Black-oriented blog use was also associated with more symptoms of depression and anxiety and did not moderate effects of Strong Black Woman endorsement on well-being. Clinicians, instructors, parents, and media activists should be mindful of how the use of both traditional and race-related social media may be both liberating for, and detrimental to, Black women’s well-being.

Social media use links with 2 major concerns of adolescents, namely, appearance and comparing favorably with others. Founded on theory, our purpose was to develop a reliable and valid measure of appearance preoccupation online, the Social Media Appearance Preoccupation Scale (SMAPS). In Study 1 (N = 283 Grade 9–12 students), Australian adolescents completed surveys containing 21 SMAPS items. After psychometric analyses, 18 retained items loaded highly on factors tapping (a) online self-presentation, (b) appearance-related activity online, or (c) appearance comparison. The items loading on each factor had high interitem correlations, and girls had higher SMAPS scores than boys. In Study 2 (N = 327 Australian university students <26 years), the SMAPS was confirmed and validated with a range of measures of social media use, emotional adjustment, appearance concerns, and social behaviors. Factor loadings were invariant by gender, SMAPS subscale scores had very small correlations with age, and incremental validity was tested and supported. Additionally, SMAPS subscale scores interacted with general social media use, adding to the explanation of appearance anxiety. The SMAPS will be a useful resource for the study of appearance-related social media use and interactions with friends and others online. (APA PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)

The article “Social media effects on young women’s body image concerns: Theoretical perspectives and an agenda for research” by Perloff (2014) extends the study of media effects on women’s body image concerns by including social media. His article is important because of the increasing use and unique nature of social media, and it can provide an avenue for future research. The main focus of this commentary is to critically examine the arguments of Perloff (2014) and to provide suggestions on how to extend his model. We begin by emphasizing the importance of culture on body image and provide a theoretical extension based on the theoretical construct of self-construal. Next, we propose to differentiate social media use as motivated by general social media use (e.g., socializing and entertainment) from that driven by specific needs related to body image concerns (e.g., pro-eating disorder sites). In addition, we suggest differentiating mere exposure to content from the active use of social media, such as commenting and posting. Finally, we recommend advancing the research on body image beyond the thin ideal because body dissatisfaction can be related to various body parts (e.g., breast size, skin color, and eye shape), and we recommend including participants beyond adolescence, integrating multiple methods, and conducting research on interventions. The aim of this commentary is not to provide a framework for specific cultures or social contexts, but to offer suggestions that encourage researchers to broaden the scope of research on body image concerns.

This research was motivated by an interest in understanding how social media are applied in teaching in higher education. Data were collected using an online questionnaire, completed by 333 instructors in higher education, that asked about general social media use and specific use in teaching. Education and learning theories suggest three potential reasons for instructors to use social media in their teaching: (1) exposing students to practices, (2) extending the range of the learning environment, and (3) promoting learning through social interaction and collaboration. Answers to open-ended questions about how social media were used in teaching, and results of a factor analysis of coded results, revealed six distinct factors that align with these reasons for use: (1) facilitating student engagement, (2) instructor’s organization for teaching, (3) engagement with outside resources, (4) enhancing student attention to content, (5) building communities of practice, and (6) resource discovery. These factors accord with a Uses and Gratifications perspective that depicts adopters as active media users choosing and shaping media use to meet their own needs. Results provide a more comprehensive picture of social media use than found in previous work, encompassing not only the array of media used but also the range of purposes associated with use of social media in contemporary teaching initiatives.

This study examines the relationships between social media use for health information, exposure to HPV vaccine misinformation, and online health information-seeking behaviours from institutional sources (i.e., professional health websites and search engines) among college students. The results show that people who seek health information from social media tend to have more experiences of encountering HPV vaccine misinformation during their social media use, while there was no significant relationship between general social media use and exposure to HPV vaccine misinformation. This study also found that people with many experiences of encountering HPV misinformation on social media are more likely to use professional health websites when they look for health information online. However, there was no relationship between exposure to misinformation on social media and the use of search engines for health information seeking.