Adolescents' Intense and Problematic Social Media Use and Their Well-Being in 29 Countries

Abstract

Purpose This study examined (1) whether intense and problematic social media use (SMU) were independently associated with adolescent well-being; (2) whether these associations varied by the country-level prevalence of intense and problematic SMU; and (3) whether differences in the country-level prevalence of intense and problematic SMU were related to differences in mobile Internet access. Methods Individual-level data came from 154,981 adolescents (mean age = 13.5) from 29 countries that participated in the 2017/2018 Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) survey. Intense SMU was measured by the time spent on social media, whereas problematic SMU was defined by symptoms of addiction to social media. Mental (life satisfaction and psychological complaints), school (school satisfaction and perceived school pressure), and social (family support and friend support) well-being were assessed. Country-level data came from aggregated individual-level data and data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on Internet access. Results Two-level regression analyses indicated that in countries with a lower prevalence of intense SMU, intense users reported lower levels of life satisfaction and family support and more psychological complaints than nonintense users. In contrast, in countries with a higher prevalence of intense SMU, intense users reported higher levels of family support and life satisfaction than nonintense users, and similar levels of psychological complaints. In all countries, intense users reported more friend support than nonintense users. The findings regarding problematic SMU were more consistent: In all countries, problematic users reported lower well-being on all domains than nonproblematic users. Observed differences in country-level prevalence rates of intense and problematic SMU could not be explained by mobile Internet access. Conclusions Adolescents reporting problematic SMU are particularly at risk of lower well-being. In many countries, intense SMU may be a normative adolescent behavior that contributes positively to specific domains of their well-being.

Problematic Social Media Use and Health among Adolescents

“…Problematic social media use is of concern for 9.4% of Finnish adolescents. This is close to the European average (7.4%) [18], while a further 33.5% could be characterized as at moderate risk of developing problematic behaviour. Problematic social media use was most common among the older age groups, and among persons with moderate or low school achievement, low health literacy, and low parental monitoring.…”

A bio-ecological framing of evidence on the determinants of adolescent mental health - A scoping review of the international Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children (HBSC) study 1983–2020

“… Boer et al (2020) examined the relationship between intense social media use (SMU) and mental health at individual and country levels. Intense users reported lower levels of life satisfaction and more psychological complaints than non-intense users.…”

Assessing Problematic Social Media Use in Adolescents by Parental Ratings: Development and Validation of the Social Media Disorder Scale for Parents (SMDS-P)

“…According to Ng et al (2015), life satisfaction is positively related to adolescents’ school grades [ 65 ] and could therefore act as a moderator between PSMU and academic performance, which becomes apparent later in time. Boer et al (2020) described an overall lower school satisfaction and higher school pressure in adolescents with PSMU across all of the 29 countries investigated [ 23 ]. Moreover, Scott et al (2019) revealed that extensive SM users were more likely to report late sleep onset and wake times on school days as well as trouble falling back asleep after night-time awakening than average users [ 66 ].…”

“…It was translated into different languages, validated in samples of adolescents in Europe and China and proved to be a psychometrically sound instrument [ 12 , 21 , 22 ]. It was recently applied to estimate the prevalence rates of PSMU among 10- to 17-year-old adolescents from 29 European countries [ 23 ]. The values ranged from 3.22% (Netherlands) via 5.35% (Germany) to 14.17% (Spain), with an average prevalence of 7.38%.…”