Pattern of Facebook use by university students during the COVID-19 pandemic: relations with loneliness and resilience

Abstract

Considering young adults’ extensive use of social media since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the present study examined the pattern of Facebook use by university students during the period of hygienic crisis. Specifically, it was investigated students’ Facebook intensity use and self-disclosure to unknown online friends, as well as the role of sense of resilience and loneliness in the manifestation of the above Facebook behaviors. Overall, 792 undergraduate and postgraduate university students (48% women) completed online self-report questionnaires regarding the above variables. Undergraduate students, regardless of gender and Department of studies, made more intense Facebook use and self-disclosure to unknown online friends. Sense of loneliness positively predicted students’ online self-disclosure not only directly but also indirectly through their Facebook intensity use. Students’ resilience negatively moderated the relationship between sense of loneliness and Facebook behaviors. The findings propose a new explanatory model of emotional and behavioral mechanisms, which leads to a less safe pattern of Facebook use. This pattern possibly reflects youth’s collective tendency to use this social media platform recklessly as a way out of crisis periods, such as the pandemic period. The emergence of this pattern could be useful for launching or enriching university counselling/prevention actions aimed at strengthening students’ psycho-emotional skills, and subsequently their prudent use of social media.