Determination the cut-off point for the Bergen social media addiction (BSMAS): Diagnostic contribution of the six criteria of the components model of addiction for social media disorder

Abstract

ObjectiveSocial media disorder (SMD) is an increasing problem, especially in adolescents. The lack of a consensual classification for SMD hinders the further development of the research field. The six components of Griffiths’ biopsychosocial model of addiction have been the most widely used criteria to assess and diagnosis SMD. The Bergen social media addiction scale (BSMAS) based on Griffiths’ six criteria is a widely used instrument to assess the symptoms and prevalence of SMD in populations. This study aims to: (1) determine the optimal cut-off point for the BSMAS to identify SMD among Chinese adolescents, and (2) evaluate the contribution of specific criteria to the diagnosis of SMD.MethodStructured diagnostic interviews in a clinical sample (n = 252) were performed to determine the optimal clinical cut-off point for the BSMAS. The BSMAS was further used to investigate SMD in a community sample of 21,375 adolescents.ResultsThe BSMAS score of 24 was determined as the best cut-off score based on the gold standards of clinical diagnosis. The estimated 12-month prevalence of SMD among Chinese adolescents was 3.5%. According to conditional inference trees analysis, the criteria “mood modification”, “conflict”, “withdrawal”, and “relapse” showed the higher predictive power for SMD diagnosis.ConclusionsResults suggest that a BSMAS score of 24 is the optimal clinical cut-off score for future research that measure SMD and its impact on health among adolescents. Furthermore, criteria of “mood modification”, “conflict”, “withdrawal”, and “relapse” are the most relevant to the diagnosis of SMA in Chinese adolescents.

The Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale Validity in a Romanian Sample Using Item Response Theory and Network Analysis

“…Our findings showed that the prevalence of participants whose overall score on SMA exceeds the clinical cut-off is 4.25%. This value is similar to that obtained by Luo et al ( 2021 ), who reported that 3.25% of the participants were addicted users.…”

“…First, this is the first validation study of the BSMAS conducted in an Eastern European country, more precisely in Romanian culture. Previous validation studies of adapted version of BSMAS were conducted in Western (Monacis et al, 2017 ), American (Watson et al, 2020 ), and Asian cultures (Chen et al, 2020 ; Lin et al, 2017 ; Luo et al, 2021 ). Second, this is the first study based on the modern approach of GRM analysis in the framework of IRT.…”

“…The score of 19 was established as an empirical cut-off by Bányai et al ( 2017 ). Recently, Luo et al ( 2021 ) proposed a score of 24 as a clinical cut-off point, based on gold standard of clinical diagnosis. In addition, they found that the score of 19 has low accuracy and thus overstates the prevalence of SMA in the sense that those individuals without disorder are wrongly included in the category of addictive users.…”

From Emotional (Dys)Regulation to Internet Addiction: A Mediation Model of Problematic Social Media Use among Italian Young Adults

“…It is based on the six dimensions proposed by Griffiths [ 89 ] (i.e., salience, mood, modification, tolerance, withdrawal conflict, relapse) and consists of six items (e.g., “How often during the last year have you tried to cut down on the use of social media without success?”) that are rated on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (very rarely) to 5 (very often). Higher scores indicate a greater risk of developing social media addiction, with the score of 24 recently indicated as the best cut-off score for a possible clinical diagnosis [ 90 ]. The present study applied the Italian version of the test, developed by Monacis et al [ 91 ].…”

The Capacity to Be Alone Moderates Psychopathological Symptoms and Social Networks Use in Adolescents during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Higher scores in this scale indicate higher problematic use of SN. The clinical cut-off for this measure is 24 [ 22 ]. As in previous studies on the general population [ 23 ], in this research, no subject exceeded the clinical cut-off for problematic use and the internal consistency of the scale was good.…”