Abstract
We investigated behavioral and neural mechanisms in the relation between social media use (SMU) and self-concept, as well as longitudinal developmental outcomes. Adolescents and young adults (N = 150, 11–21 years old at T1) rated themselves on 60 traits in the academic, physical and prosocial domain, and also indicated how they thought peers would judge them (reflected-peer-judgements). Longitudinal questionnaires (1- and 2-year follow-up) were collected to assess positive (prosocial behavior, self-concept clarity) and negative (clinical symptoms) long-term outcomes.Results indicated that heavier self-reported SMU was linked with lower difference scores between self-judgements and reflected-peer-judgements. Lower SMU was related to more positive ratings from self-judgements vs. reflected-peer-judgements. SMU was also associated with less positive self-concept, particularly in the academic domain (boys and girls) and physical domain (girls). Neurally, increased SMU was linked to heightened mPFC-activity during self-judgements compared to reflected-peer-judgements, and increased activity during physical compared to academic and prosocial self-judgements. Longitudinal analyses indicated no evidence for long-term effects of social media use, self/reflected-peer-difference scores and mPFC-activity on clinical symptoms, prosocial behavior or self-concept clarity. This study highlights the complex relationship between social media use and wellbeing and future research is needed to confirm the lack of long-term effects.
Highlights
Social media use (SMU) is rapidly becoming omnipresent, especially amongst adolescents (Anderson and Jiang, 2018)
A moderation analysis revealed that sex moderated the relation between SMU and physical self-concept (F(4,131) = 3.66, p = .007), such that SMU was related to less positive physical self-concept in girls (F(2,73) = 4.73, p = .012, R2 = .12; β=-.33, p = .004) but not boys (Fig. 3)
There was no relation between SMU and prosocial self-concept
Summary
Social media use (SMU) is rapidly becoming omnipresent, especially amongst adolescents (Anderson and Jiang, 2018). It is important to consider whether and how SMU affects self-concept in adolescence. Prior work on whether SMU affects self-concept (the estimated qualities and traits of the self) or the related construct of self-esteem (a feeling of self-worth) are contradictory. Several studies reported nega tive effects, i.e. an association between increased SMU and lower selfesteem (Woods and Scott, 2016) and a connection between emotional investment in social network sites and reduced self-esteem (Blomfield Neira and Barber, 2014). Other studies point towards positive effects, such as a link between socializing on social media and higher self-esteem (Apaolaza et al, 2013), and higher self-esteem after viewing one’s own Facebook profile (Gonzales and Hancock, 2011)
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