Investigating the Cognitive Control of Social Media-Anxious Users Using a Psychological Experimental Approach

Abstract

Social media has become increasingly popular and is now a significant tool for daily communication for many people. The use of social media can cause anxiety and have detrimental impacts on mental health. Cognitive impairment is more likely to affect individuals with anxiety. Investigating the cognitive abilities and mental health of social media users requires the development of new methodologies. This study employed the AX-Continuous Performance Test (AX-CPT) paradigm and the Stroop paradigm to study the cognitive control characteristics of trait anxiety, drawing on psychological experimental methods. Previous studies on whether trait anxiety impairs cognitive control remain controversial, possibly because cognitive control is viewed as a whole. It may also be due to the motivational effect of anxiety, which compensates for the impairment of cognitive control caused by anxiety through the recruitment of cognitive resources. Understanding the mental health and cognitive control traits of anxious social media users can be improved by using the Dual Mechanisms of Cognitive Control Account, which divides cognitive control into proactive and reactive control. The findings demonstrate that trait anxiety has an impact on both proactive and reactive control, while working memory load did not modulate the effect of trait anxiety on cognitive control. These results support the attentional control theory and provide a new approach to studying the mental health of social media users.