psychology essay

psychology essay

Exploring the Impact of Social Media on Mental Health: A Psychological Perspective

1. Introduction to Social Media and Mental Health

Findings from some studies also suggest that social media induce a person to establish more online relationships without increasing the number of real friends. This is leading to the feeling of being left out of activities that generate pleasing emotions, contributing to one’s loneliness and, therefore, to a negative impact on an individual’s mental health, well-being, and depression. The phenomenon of gaining more virtual friends and subsequently feeling lonely is stated as “the paradox of social media,” emphasizing the idea that the more virtual friends users have, the lonelier they feel. Supporters of the new kind and the virtual amount of friendship are usually overestimating the real-life friendship. Even though many friends on social media profiles signify, to some extent, some sociability on the virtual level, with no in-depth private conversations, deep emotional aspects, or relationships’ support physically shared, virtual friendships are limited and maintain a superficial peripheral existence.

Social media platforms are websites or applications that allow personal and business connections, sharing or creating content, and interaction via messages, comments, posts, and multimedia materials. They offer users the capability of keeping in touch with people who might be located at disparate places while providing a large personalized network that makes communication quick and easy. These advancements in digital technology come with a dark side as they have been linked to both emotional and mental health problems. This link has been corroborated by several meta-analyses studies. Hoffner and Cohen underscored that social media photos usually reflect what the users want, highlighting where the latter traveled, events attended, whom they are with, and what they look like but do not reveal other, less palpable psychological aspects such as emotions, mental reactions, and thoughts. The authors concluded that social media photos are connoting a lighter view of users’ lives, excluding complex and intimate psychological. The latter point subscribers to other people not finding support for their sadness, fears, and other vulnerable states, contributing to a negative psychological impact on one’s subjective well-being, narcissism, and life satisfaction.

2. Theoretical Frameworks in Psychology for Understanding Social Media Impact

In sum, both behaviors with senses of loss of control around technologies specifically, impacting on levels of negative emotions and comparing to those in restful states, patterns of addiction criteria, and those typical of dependency rather than addiction, for many. So, although criteria arise with technology, we cannot reinforce notions of addiction unless we understand and modify the ways in which technology is being used. These points will be highlighted in the text where each more widely identified detrimental social and mental health condition is discussed in turn.

Social media is a hugely pervasive and influential field that is increasingly playing an important role in relation to mental health. Understanding the psychological implications of such use is therefore considered an important extension of the current psychological knowledge base. We argue that both (social) cognitive psychology and the vibrant, growing field of persuasive technology have much to contribute here, developing our understanding and potentially mitigating the potential negative effects of this kind of technology. Specifically, we situate our discussion within the scene of mental health with a focus on the ways in which we can design technology to create more positive behavior change and mental health approaches in relation to its use, and contrast this with an understanding of the negative issues with social media use that are relevant to mental health.

3. Empirical Studies on Social Media Use and Mental Health

However, in contrast to findings that exemplify the negative impact of social media on mental health, several contradictory results also exist. For instance, in a study by Huang, et al., the use of social media was not directly associated with negative impacts on well-being, including self-reported health, depression, life satisfaction, and body mass index indicators. Another study by Gattino and Milani shows that social media use might diminish social isolation among elderly people, who might benefit more from internet-based communication than from direct contact within their immediate social network. Such conflicting results call into question the negative association between the use of social media and mental health problems. The complex relationship between social media use and mental health outcomes requires a deeper, activity-leveled investigation, where surface-level measurements should be avoided.

In response to concerns over social media use and mental health, several empirical studies have been conducted to explore the relationships between social media use and mental health-related outcomes. A study of approximately ten thousand students from ten US colleges by Primack, et al. found that heavy social media users have 2.7 times greater risk of depression than rare or non-users, connecting the use of social media to negative mental health outcomes. Shapiro and Margolin provide another empirical study that reveals that more intensive use of social network sites is linked with poor coping skills and increasing symptoms of anxiety and depression over time, suggesting social media’s negative impact on mental health. Furthermore, analysis of self-reported data on social media use among British adolescents by Sascha O. K. suggests that the adverse effects of social media on mental health exist only for the relatively rare group of social media users with signs of addiction.

4. Practical Implications and Interventions for Promoting Positive Mental Health in the Digital Age

In recent research on users up to 24 years old, several types of social media impact were considered, including social media intensity, social media preference, and social media peer popularity. Not unexpectedly, young females used social media slightly more intensively than young males. However, with respect to the preference for certain types of social media activities, differences between young and old were less pronounced than expected, with one remarkable exception: young individuals valued updating their profile and sharing and chatting with friends more than older individuals did. Having a large number of friends and receiving many likes mattered more to females than to males. The preference for sharing experiences, emotions, and photos with friends was negatively related to age, implying a relative disinterest in sharing these aspects of life as people grow older.

Secondly, the extent to which social media consumption plays a role in the general landscape of factors that shape mental health is still largely an open question. From a psychological perspective, it is crucial to realize that not everything about social media usage, not even for young users, can be summarized in terms of happiness or mental distress. Large differences exist between individuals in the way they use social media: what they do, whom they follow, whom they unfriend, and so on. Only by taking into account the heterogeneity of the different experiences that young people get from using social media can we gain a better understanding of the influence of different types of exposure on different types of mental health-related outcomes.

Firstly, exposure to social media can alter the mood, self-esteem, and jealousy of users, thereby inducing feelings of loneliness and depressive symptoms. This is not only true for adults, but also for the digital natives growing up in a world where living without screens seems unimaginable. However, it is almost self-evident that the impact of social media on the mental health of young users can be especially relevant.

In the digital age, most of us spend a considerable amount of time online and, more specifically, on social media platforms. From a mental health perspective, this creates both opportunities and challenges that deserve attention from professionals. Before we elaborate on the concrete implications for research and practice, we want to briefly reflect on a few basic insights arising from psychological research on the topic.