Mental Health
Time Out: a scoping review of non-duration based social media use measures and adolescent mental health Jonathan Platt* Jonathan Platt Amanda Sursely Bengi Baran Gerta Bardhoshi
Background: Research to understand the role of social media use (SMU) in explaining deteriorating adolescent mental health has been limited by an overreliance on broad, nonspecific measures of ‘time spent on social media’. These measures provide insufficient detail to capture unique risk and protective factors to users.
Methods/Approach: We conducted a scoping review of observational and experimental studies of the relationship between SMU and mental health outcomes in adolescents ≤18 years. Studies that measured SMU solely based on time spent on a platform were excluded.
Results: The initial search returned 868 articles. After inclusion and exclusion, we identified 217 studies, but a further 133 (61%) used duration-based SMU measures and were excluded. Of the 83 remaining studies, most focused on depression (48%), or anxiety (23%). Studies used 85 distinct measures of SMU, and fewer than half (n=37; 45%) provided evidence of validity. SMU measures were grouped into five domains, including SMU habits, addiction-like measures, structural aspects, interactions on SM, and feelings about SM. Social comparison and addiction-related measures were consistently linked with depression and anxiety symptoms. SMU for socialization and was consistently shown to improve loneliness, though evidence of other protective effects was otherwise limited.
Conclusion: The relationship between SMU and adolescent mental health is a dynamic and complex part of adolescent social development, with features that features that may variably influence mental health outcomes depending on the context of use.
Significance/Contribution: These findings contribute to a more complete understanding of specific types of SMU that contribute to adolescent mental health. This specificity may help to identify modifiable targets for use in prevention programs and policy development.
