Abstract

Social media including texting, internet use, and Facebook time have differential effects but those have not been studied during the social isolation of lockdowns when they might be more prevalent. In this Survey Monkey study, as many as 98% of 260 respondents reported texting, 100% using the internet, and 91% being on Facebook. The percentiles for those using the different media “a lot” were 45%, 77% and 42% respectively. Correlation analyses suggested that texting and internet use were positively related to Connecting Scale scores. However, internet use was also positively related to scores on Stress, Anxiety and Depression Scales and Facebook use was positively related to not only scores on Stress, Anxiety and Depression Scales but also to scores on Fatigue, Sleep Disturbance and PTSD scales. ANOVAS based on comparisons between groups reporting no to moderate use versus “a lot” of use were confirmatory of the correlation analyses. These results are limited by their being self-reported data from a non-representative, cross-sectional sample. Nonetheless, they highlight the positive and negative effects of different social media during a COVID-19 lockdown.

Highlights

  • Social media including texting, internet use, and Facebook time *Correspondence to Author: have differential effects but those have not been studied during TiffanyField[1,2] the social isolation of lockdowns when they might be more prev- 1University of Miami/Miller School alent

  • The authors suggested that internet use may be reinforced by experiencing relief from negative feelings and that the positive effects were related to social relationship satisfaction that occurred on the Internet, especially for older adults

  • The authors selected age as an independent variable and internet use as the dependent measure and reported that younger age contributed to greater internet use.11That finding was not surprising inasmuch as internet on these studies, social media might be expected to be even more related to negative emotions because of less activity and social contact during lockdowns like COVID-19

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Summary

Introduction

Internet use, and Facebook time *Correspondence to Author: have differential effects but those have not been studied during TiffanyField[1,2] the social isolation of lockdowns when they might be more prev- 1University of Miami/Miller School alent. Excessive Internet use has been associated with depression.[8] And, Internet addiction has been related to both depression and anxiety.[9, 10] It would appear that social media and negative mood states are reciprocal at least in crosssectional studies like these depending on the somewhat arbitrary selection of independent and dependent variables Those with higher anxiety levels in one study were noted to be internet addicted.[11] In the same study, the authors selected age as an independent variable and internet use as the dependent measure and reported that younger age contributed to greater internet use.11That finding was not surprising inasmuch as internet on these studies, social media might be expected to be even more related to negative emotions because of less activity and social contact during lockdowns like COVID-19. Social media might be expected to increase social connections and decrease stresses related to being socially isolated such as depression and anxiety

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