Sociable Squared Ana Rivera

You have an online profile on instagram and recently have been creeping on your friend who's on vacation. You think to yourself  “ Man, I need to go out so I can post a picture, what I’m I doing with MY life?” it gives you this sort of social anxiety because your friends are posting and you have been losing followers; feeling left out you think you need to showcase that you are living THE life, too.

Hi! Welcome to the Sociable^2 Podcast! My name is Ana, a psychology student at McMaster University, here to tell you, that the time --tik tok tik tok on the clock… you spend on social media has no relationship with your mental wellbeing. Wait what?? Let me explain….

A new 2020 study, from Brigham Young University where researchers have accumulated 8 years of ongoing surveying of 500 teens, are now confident to say that there is no relationship between time spent on social media and poor mental health. These teens were surveyed according to their gender group and age group. They were asked questions on the time spent on social media: which the averaged at 2 hours per day and questions about depressive emotions and anxious behaviours (Coyne et al 2020). Researchers reviewed the surveys to see if teens mental wellbeing, now young adults, had decreased over usage- which past studies have claimed in the past.

But in this new study, the time spent on instagram and facebook did not show any negative effect on the teens mental wellbeing over the years.

IF there is no such relation, then why have we been taught to blame our socials for our mental issues? Multiple studies investigated from researchers at the University of Florida have the ANSWER, IT IS NOT  how much time you spend on social media, but the way social media time is spent(Orben et al. 2019). Let me repeat that “it is not how much time you spend on social media but the WAY social media time is spent”...and this goes especially when you are comparing yourself to YOUR FRIEND negatively.

SO next time you THINK OF cutting Instagram screen time tik tok tik tok, STOP AND ASK YOURSELF IF YOU HAVE ARE USING YOUR SOCIALS IN AN UNHEALTHY WAY.

If you do end up going out to have the next top worthy instagram picture, think why you feel the need to post something: is to show off versus genuinely wanting to share a memory with your friends.

Thank your listening to the Sociable^2 podcast, and have sociable day :)