IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/tbitxx/v43y2024i7p1312-1325.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Social media use, loneliness and psychological distress in emerging adults

Author

Listed:
  • Zoe Taylor
  • Ala Yankouskaya
  • Constantina Panourgia

Abstract

Social media plays a dominant role in emerging adults’ lives, with evidence showing that it can contribute to elevated levels of psychological distress. However, existing findings are contradictory, insofar as the connection between social media use (SMU) and psychological distress remains unclear. To gain a better insight into the above relationship, we focused on different styles of engagement with social media (active social, active non-social, and passive) and examined whether their impact on depression, anxiety and stress symptoms is mediated by loneliness. Data were collected via an online survey from 288 emerging adults in the UK. It was found that increased passive SMU was associated with higher anxiety, depression and stress symptoms; loneliness was associated with both SMU and psychological distress, while increased active non-social media use was associated with decreased stress. However, loneliness showed significant mediation effects only on the relation between passive SMU and psychological distress. Limitations, future research directions and suggestions for practice are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Zoe Taylor & Ala Yankouskaya & Constantina Panourgia, 2024. "Social media use, loneliness and psychological distress in emerging adults," Behaviour and Information Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(7), pages 1312-1325, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:tbitxx:v:43:y:2024:i:7:p:1312-1325
    DOI: 10.1080/0144929X.2023.2209797
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/0144929X.2023.2209797
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/0144929X.2023.2209797?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:tbitxx:v:43:y:2024:i:7:p:1312-1325. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/tbit .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.