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Effects of Social Media Use on Psychological Well-Being: A Mediated Model

Dragana ostic.

1 School of Finance and Economics, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, China

Sikandar Ali Qalati

Belem barbosa.

2 Research Unit of Governance, Competitiveness, and Public Policies (GOVCOPP), Center for Economics and Finance (cef.up), School of Economics and Management, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

Syed Mir Muhammad Shah

3 Department of Business Administration, Sukkur Institute of Business Administration (IBA) University, Sukkur, Pakistan

Esthela Galvan Vela

4 CETYS Universidad, Tijuana, Mexico

Ahmed Muhammad Herzallah

5 Department of Business Administration, Al-Quds University, Jerusalem, Israel

6 Business School, Shandong University, Weihai, China

Associated Data

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

The growth in social media use has given rise to concerns about the impacts it may have on users' psychological well-being. This paper's main objective is to shed light on the effect of social media use on psychological well-being. Building on contributions from various fields in the literature, it provides a more comprehensive study of the phenomenon by considering a set of mediators, including social capital types (i.e., bonding social capital and bridging social capital), social isolation, and smartphone addiction. The paper includes a quantitative study of 940 social media users from Mexico, using structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the proposed hypotheses. The findings point to an overall positive indirect impact of social media usage on psychological well-being, mainly due to the positive effect of bonding and bridging social capital. The empirical model's explanatory power is 45.1%. This paper provides empirical evidence and robust statistical analysis that demonstrates both positive and negative effects coexist, helping to reconcile the inconsistencies found so far in the literature.

Introduction

The use of social media has grown substantially in recent years (Leong et al., 2019 ; Kemp, 2020 ). Social media refers to “the websites and online tools that facilitate interactions between users by providing them opportunities to share information, opinions, and interest” (Swar and Hameed, 2017 , p. 141). Individuals use social media for many reasons, including entertainment, communication, and searching for information. Notably, adolescents and young adults are spending an increasing amount of time on online networking sites, e-games, texting, and other social media (Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ). In fact, some authors (e.g., Dhir et al., 2018 ; Tateno et al., 2019 ) have suggested that social media has altered the forms of group interaction and its users' individual and collective behavior around the world.

Consequently, there are increased concerns regarding the possible negative impacts associated with social media usage addiction (Swar and Hameed, 2017 ; Kircaburun et al., 2020 ), particularly on psychological well-being (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Smartphones sometimes distract their users from relationships and social interaction (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Li et al., 2020a ), and several authors have stressed that the excessive use of social media may lead to smartphone addiction (Swar and Hameed, 2017 ; Leong et al., 2019 ), primarily because of the fear of missing out (Reer et al., 2019 ; Roberts and David, 2020 ). Social media usage has been associated with anxiety, loneliness, and depression (Dhir et al., 2018 ; Reer et al., 2019 ), social isolation (Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ), and “phubbing,” which refers to the extent to which an individual uses, or is distracted by, their smartphone during face-to-face communication with others (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ).

However, social media use also contributes to building a sense of connectedness with relevant others (Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ), which may reduce social isolation. Indeed, social media provides several ways to interact both with close ties, such as family, friends, and relatives, and weak ties, including coworkers, acquaintances, and strangers (Chen and Li, 2017 ), and plays a key role among people of all ages as they exploit their sense of belonging in different communities (Roberts and David, 2020 ). Consequently, despite the fears regarding the possible negative impacts of social media usage on well-being, there is also an increasing number of studies highlighting social media as a new communication channel (Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ; Barbosa et al., 2020 ), stressing that it can play a crucial role in developing one's presence, identity, and reputation, thus facilitating social interaction, forming and maintaining relationships, and sharing ideas (Carlson et al., 2016 ), which consequently may be significantly correlated to social support (Chen and Li, 2017 ; Holliman et al., 2021 ). Interestingly, recent studies (e.g., David et al., 2018 ; Bano et al., 2019 ; Barbosa et al., 2020 ) have suggested that the impact of smartphone usage on psychological well-being depends on the time spent on each type of application and the activities that users engage in.

Hence, the literature provides contradictory cues regarding the impacts of social media on users' well-being, highlighting both the possible negative impacts and the social enhancement it can potentially provide. In line with views on the need to further investigate social media usage (Karikari et al., 2017 ), particularly regarding its societal implications (Jiao et al., 2017 ), this paper argues that there is an urgent need to further understand the impact of the time spent on social media on users' psychological well-being, namely by considering other variables that mediate and further explain this effect.

One of the relevant perspectives worth considering is that provided by social capital theory, which is adopted in this paper. Social capital theory has previously been used to study how social media usage affects psychological well-being (e.g., Bano et al., 2019 ). However, extant literature has so far presented only partial models of associations that, although statistically acceptable and contributing to the understanding of the scope of social networks, do not provide as comprehensive a vision of the phenomenon as that proposed within this paper. Furthermore, the contradictory views, suggesting both negative (e.g., Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ) and positive impacts (Carlson et al., 2016 ; Chen and Li, 2017 ; Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ) of social media on psychological well-being, have not been adequately explored.

Given this research gap, this paper's main objective is to shed light on the effect of social media use on psychological well-being. As explained in detail in the next section, this paper explores the mediating effect of bonding and bridging social capital. To provide a broad view of the phenomenon, it also considers several variables highlighted in the literature as affecting the relationship between social media usage and psychological well-being, namely smartphone addiction, social isolation, and phubbing. The paper utilizes a quantitative study conducted in Mexico, comprising 940 social media users, and uses structural equation modeling (SEM) to test a set of research hypotheses.

This article provides several contributions. First, it adds to existing literature regarding the effect of social media use on psychological well-being and explores the contradictory indications provided by different approaches. Second, it proposes a conceptual model that integrates complementary perspectives on the direct and indirect effects of social media use. Third, it offers empirical evidence and robust statistical analysis that demonstrates that both positive and negative effects coexist, helping resolve the inconsistencies found so far in the literature. Finally, this paper provides insights on how to help reduce the potential negative effects of social media use, as it demonstrates that, through bridging and bonding social capital, social media usage positively impacts psychological well-being. Overall, the article offers valuable insights for academics, practitioners, and society in general.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section Literature Review presents a literature review focusing on the factors that explain the impact of social media usage on psychological well-being. Based on the literature review, a set of hypotheses are defined, resulting in the proposed conceptual model, which includes both the direct and indirect effects of social media usage on psychological well-being. Section Research Methodology explains the methodological procedures of the research, followed by the presentation and discussion of the study's results in section Results. Section Discussion is dedicated to the conclusions and includes implications, limitations, and suggestions for future research.

Literature Review

Putnam ( 1995 , p. 664–665) defined social capital as “features of social life – networks, norms, and trust – that enable participants to act together more effectively to pursue shared objectives.” Li and Chen ( 2014 , p. 117) further explained that social capital encompasses “resources embedded in one's social network, which can be assessed and used for instrumental or expressive returns such as mutual support, reciprocity, and cooperation.”

Putnam ( 1995 , 2000 ) conceptualized social capital as comprising two dimensions, bridging and bonding, considering the different norms and networks in which they occur. Bridging social capital refers to the inclusive nature of social interaction and occurs when individuals from different origins establish connections through social networks. Hence, bridging social capital is typically provided by heterogeneous weak ties (Li and Chen, 2014 ). This dimension widens individual social horizons and perspectives and provides extended access to resources and information. Bonding social capital refers to the social and emotional support each individual receives from his or her social networks, particularly from close ties (e.g., family and friends).

Overall, social capital is expected to be positively associated with psychological well-being (Bano et al., 2019 ). Indeed, Williams ( 2006 ) stressed that interaction generates affective connections, resulting in positive impacts, such as emotional support. The following sub-sections use the lens of social capital theory to explore further the relationship between the use of social media and psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Social Capital, and Psychological Well-Being

The effects of social media usage on social capital have gained increasing scholarly attention, and recent studies have highlighted a positive relationship between social media use and social capital (Brown and Michinov, 2019 ; Tefertiller et al., 2020 ). Li and Chen ( 2014 ) hypothesized that the intensity of Facebook use by Chinese international students in the United States was positively related to social capital forms. A longitudinal survey based on the quota sampling approach illustrated the positive effects of social media use on the two social capital dimensions (Chen and Li, 2017 ). Abbas and Mesch ( 2018 ) argued that, as Facebook usage increases, it will also increase users' social capital. Karikari et al. ( 2017 ) also found positive effects of social media use on social capital. Similarly, Pang ( 2018 ) studied Chinese students residing in Germany and found positive effects of social networking sites' use on social capital, which, in turn, was positively associated with psychological well-being. Bano et al. ( 2019 ) analyzed the 266 students' data and found positive effects of WhatsApp use on social capital forms and the positive effect of social capital on psychological well-being, emphasizing the role of social integration in mediating this positive effect.

Kim and Kim ( 2017 ) stressed the importance of having a heterogeneous network of contacts, which ultimately enhances the potential social capital. Overall, the manifest and social relations between people from close social circles (bonding social capital) and from distant social circles (bridging social capital) are strengthened when they promote communication, social support, and the sharing of interests, knowledge, and skills, which are shared with other members. This is linked to positive effects on interactions, such as acceptance, trust, and reciprocity, which are related to the individuals' health and psychological well-being (Bekalu et al., 2019 ), including when social media helps to maintain social capital between social circles that exist outside of virtual communities (Ellison et al., 2007 ).

Grounded on the above literature, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

• H1a: Social media use is positively associated with bonding social capital.
• H1b: Bonding social capital is positively associated with psychological well-being.
• H2a: Social media use is positively associated with bridging social capital.
• H2b: Bridging social capital is positively associated with psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Social Isolation, and Psychological Well-Being

Social isolation is defined as “a deficit of personal relationships or being excluded from social networks” (Choi and Noh, 2019 , p. 4). The state that occurs when an individual lacks true engagement with others, a sense of social belonging, and a satisfying relationship is related to increased mortality and morbidity (Primack et al., 2017 ). Those who experience social isolation are deprived of social relationships and lack contact with others or involvement in social activities (Schinka et al., 2012 ). Social media usage has been associated with anxiety, loneliness, and depression (Dhir et al., 2018 ; Reer et al., 2019 ), and social isolation (Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ). However, some recent studies have argued that social media use decreases social isolation (Primack et al., 2017 ; Meshi et al., 2020 ). Indeed, the increased use of social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Twitter, among others, may provide opportunities for decreasing social isolation. For instance, the improved interpersonal connectivity achieved via videos and images on social media helps users evidence intimacy, attenuating social isolation (Whaite et al., 2018 ).

Chappell and Badger ( 1989 ) stated that social isolation leads to decreased psychological well-being, while Choi and Noh ( 2019 ) concluded that greater social isolation is linked to increased suicide risk. Schinka et al. ( 2012 ) further argued that, when individuals experience social isolation from siblings, friends, family, or society, their psychological well-being tends to decrease. Thus, based on the literature cited above, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

• H3a: Social media use is significantly associated with social isolation.
• H3b: Social isolation is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Smartphone Addiction, Phubbing, and Psychological Well-Being

Smartphone addiction refers to “an individuals' excessive use of a smartphone and its negative effects on his/her life as a result of his/her inability to control his behavior” (Gökçearslan et al., 2018 , p. 48). Regardless of its form, smartphone addiction results in social, medical, and psychological harm to people by limiting their ability to make their own choices (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ). The rapid advancement of information and communication technologies has led to the concept of social media, e-games, and also to smartphone addiction (Chatterjee, 2020 ). The excessive use of smartphones for social media use, entertainment (watching videos, listening to music), and playing e-games is more common amongst people addicted to smartphones (Jeong et al., 2016 ). In fact, previous studies have evidenced the relationship between social use and smartphone addiction (Salehan and Negahban, 2013 ; Jeong et al., 2016 ; Swar and Hameed, 2017 ). In line with this, the following hypotheses are proposed:

• H4a: Social media use is positively associated with smartphone addiction.
• H4b: Smartphone addiction is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

While smartphones are bringing individuals closer, they are also, to some extent, pulling people apart (Tonacci et al., 2019 ). For instance, they can lead to individuals ignoring others with whom they have close ties or physical interactions; this situation normally occurs due to extreme smartphone use (i.e., at the dinner table, in meetings, at get-togethers and parties, and in other daily activities). This act of ignoring others is called phubbing and is considered a common phenomenon in communication activities (Guazzini et al., 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Phubbing is also referred to as an act of snubbing others (Chatterjee, 2020 ). This term was initially used in May 2012 by an Australian advertising agency to describe the “growing phenomenon of individuals ignoring their families and friends who were called phubbee (a person who is a recipients of phubbing behavior) victim of phubber (a person who start phubbing her or his companion)” (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2018 ). Smartphone addiction has been found to be a determinant of phubbing (Kim et al., 2018 ). Other recent studies have also evidenced the association between smartphones and phubbing (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Guazzini et al., 2019 ; Tonacci et al., 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Vallespín et al. ( 2017 ) argued that phubbing behavior has a negative influence on psychological well-being and satisfaction. Furthermore, smartphone addiction is considered responsible for the development of new technologies. It may also negatively influence individual's psychological proximity (Chatterjee, 2020 ). Therefore, based on the above discussion and calls for the association between phubbing and psychological well-being to be further explored, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

• H5: Smartphone addiction is positively associated with phubbing.
• H6: Phubbing is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

Indirect Relationship Between Social Media Use and Psychological Well-Being

Beyond the direct hypotheses proposed above, this study investigates the indirect effects of social media use on psychological well-being mediated by social capital forms, social isolation, and phubbing. As described above, most prior studies have focused on the direct influence of social media use on social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing, as well as the direct impact of social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing on psychological well-being. Very few studies, however, have focused on and evidenced the mediating role of social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing derived from social media use in improving psychological well-being (Chen and Li, 2017 ; Pang, 2018 ; Bano et al., 2019 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ). Moreover, little is known about smartphone addiction's mediating role between social media use and psychological well-being. Therefore, this study aims to fill this gap in the existing literature by investigating the mediation of social capital forms, social isolation, and smartphone addiction. Further, examining the mediating influence will contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of social media use on psychological well-being via the mediating associations of smartphone addiction and psychological factors. Therefore, based on the above, we propose the following hypotheses (the conceptual model is presented in Figure 1 ):

Conceptual model.

• H7: (a) Bonding social capital; (b) bridging social capital; (c) social isolation; and (d) smartphone addiction mediate the relationship between social media use and psychological well-being.

Research Methodology

Sample procedure and online survey.

This study randomly selected students from universities in Mexico. We chose University students for the following reasons. First, students are considered the most appropriate sample for e-commerce studies, particularly in the social media context (Oghazi et al., 2018 ; Shi et al., 2018 ). Second, University students are considered to be frequent users and addicted to smartphones (Mou et al., 2017 ; Stouthuysen et al., 2018 ). Third, this study ensured that respondents were experienced, well-educated, and possessed sufficient knowledge of the drawbacks of social media and the extreme use of smartphones. A total sample size of 940 University students was ultimately achieved from the 1,500 students contacted, using a convenience random sampling approach, due both to the COVID-19 pandemic and budget and time constraints. Additionally, in order to test the model, a quantitative empirical study was conducted, using an online survey method to collect data. This study used a web-based survey distributed via social media platforms for two reasons: the COVID-19 pandemic; and to reach a large number of respondents (Qalati et al., 2021 ). Furthermore, online surveys are considered a powerful and authenticated tool for new research (Fan et al., 2021 ), while also representing a fast, simple, and less costly approach to collecting data (Dutot and Bergeron, 2016 ).

Data Collection Procedures and Respondent's Information

Data were collected by disseminating a link to the survey by e-mail and social network sites. Before presenting the closed-ended questionnaire, respondents were assured that their participation would remain voluntary, confidential, and anonymous. Data collection occurred from July 2020 to December 2020 (during the pandemic). It should be noted that, because data were collected during the pandemic, this may have had an influence on the results of the study. The reason for choosing a six-month lag time was to mitigate common method bias (CMB) (Li et al., 2020b ). In the present study, 1,500 students were contacted via University e-mail and social applications (Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram). We sent a reminder every month for 6 months (a total of six reminders), resulting in 940 valid responses. Thus, 940 (62.6% response rate) responses were used for hypotheses testing.

Table 1 reveals that, of the 940 participants, three-quarters were female (76.4%, n = 719) and nearly one-quarter (23.6%, n = 221) were male. Nearly half of the participants (48.8%, n = 459) were aged between 26 and 35 years, followed by 36 to 35 years (21.9%, n = 206), <26 (20.3%, n = 191), and over 45 (8.9%, n = 84). Approximately two-thirds (65%, n = 611) had a bachelor's degree or above, while one-third had up to 12 years of education. Regarding the daily frequency of using the Internet, nearly half (48.6%, n = 457) of the respondents reported between 5 and 8 h a day, and over one-quarter (27.2%) 9–12 h a day. Regarding the social media platforms used, over 38.5 and 39.6% reported Facebook and WhatsApp, respectively. Of the 940 respondents, only 22.1% reported Instagram (12.8%) and Twitter (9.2%). It should be noted, however, that the sample is predominantly female and well-educated.

Respondents' characteristics.

Measurement Items

The study used five-point Likert scales (1 = “strongly disagree;” 5 = “strongly agree”) to record responses.

Social Media Use

Social media use was assessed using four items adapted from Karikari et al. ( 2017 ). Sample items include “Social media is part of my everyday activity,” “Social media has become part of my daily life,” “I would be sorry if social media shut down,” and “I feel out of touch, when I have not logged onto social media for a while.” The adapted items had robust reliability and validity (CA = 783, CR = 0.857, AVE = 0.600).

Social Capital

Social capital was measured using a total of eight items, representing bonding social capital (four items) and bridging social capital (four items) adapted from Chan ( 2015 ). Sample construct items include: bonging social capital (“I am willing to spend time to support general community activities,” “I interact with people who are quite different from me”) and bridging social capital (“My social media community is a good place to be,” “Interacting with people on social media makes me want to try new things”). The adapted items had robust reliability and validity [bonding social capital (CA = 0.785, CR = 0.861, AVE = 0.608) and bridging social capital (CA = 0.834, CR = 0.883, AVE = 0.601)].

Social Isolation

Social isolation was assessed using three items from Choi and Noh ( 2019 ). Sample items include “I do not have anyone to play with,” “I feel alone from people,” and “I have no one I can trust.” This adapted scale had substantial reliability and validity (CA = 0.890, CR = 0.928, AVE = 0.811).

Smartphone Addiction

Smartphone addiction was assessed using five items taken from Salehan and Negahban ( 2013 ). Sample items include “I am always preoccupied with my mobile,” “Using my mobile phone keeps me relaxed,” and “I am not able to control myself from frequent use of mobile phones.” Again, these adapted items showed substantial reliability and validity (CA = 903, CR = 0.928, AVE = 0.809).

Phubbing was assessed using four items from Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas ( 2018 ). Sample items include: “I have conflicts with others because I am using my phone” and “I would rather pay attention to my phone than talk to others.” This construct also demonstrated significant reliability and validity (CA = 770, CR = 0.894, AVE = 0.809).

Psychological Well-Being

Psychological well-being was assessed using five items from Jiao et al. ( 2017 ). Sample items include “I lead a purposeful and meaningful life with the help of others,” “My social relationships are supportive and rewarding in social media,” and “I am engaged and interested in my daily on social media.” This study evidenced that this adapted scale had substantial reliability and validity (CA = 0.886, CR = 0.917, AVE = 0.688).

Data Analysis

Based on the complexity of the association between the proposed construct and the widespread use and acceptance of SmartPLS 3.0 in several fields (Hair et al., 2019 ), we utilized SEM, using SmartPLS 3.0, to examine the relationships between constructs. Structural equation modeling is a multivariate statistical analysis technique that is used to investigate relationships. Further, it is a combination of factor and multivariate regression analysis, and is employed to explore the relationship between observed and latent constructs.

SmartPLS 3.0 “is a more comprehensive software program with an intuitive graphical user interface to run partial least square SEM analysis, certainly has had a massive impact” (Sarstedt and Cheah, 2019 ). According to Ringle et al. ( 2015 ), this commercial software offers a wide range of algorithmic and modeling options, improved usability, and user-friendly and professional support. Furthermore, Sarstedt and Cheah ( 2019 ) suggested that structural equation models enable the specification of complex interrelationships between observed and latent constructs. Hair et al. ( 2019 ) argued that, in recent years, the number of articles published using partial least squares SEM has increased significantly in contrast to covariance-based SEM. In addition, partial least squares SEM using SmartPLS is more appealing for several scholars as it enables them to predict more complex models with several variables, indicator constructs, and structural paths, instead of imposing distributional assumptions on the data (Hair et al., 2019 ). Therefore, this study utilized the partial least squares SEM approach using SmartPLS 3.0.

Common Method Bias (CMB) Test

This study used the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) test to measure the sampling adequacy and ensure data suitability. The KMO test result was 0.874, which is greater than an acceptable threshold of 0.50 (Ali Qalati et al., 2021 ; Shrestha, 2021 ), and hence considered suitable for explanatory factor analysis. Moreover, Bartlett's test results demonstrated a significance level of 0.001, which is considered good as it is below the accepted threshold of 0.05.

The term CMB is associated with Campbell and Fiske ( 1959 ), who highlighted the importance of CMB and identified that a portion of variance in the research may be due to the methods employed. It occurs when all scales of the study are measured at the same time using a single questionnaire survey (Podsakoff and Organ, 1986 ); subsequently, estimates of the relationship among the variables might be distorted by the impacts of CMB. It is considered a serious issue that has a potential to “jeopardize” the validity of the study findings (Tehseen et al., 2017 ). There are several reasons for CMB: (1) it mainly occurs due to response “tendencies that raters can apply uniformity across the measures;” and (2) it also occurs due to similarities in the wording and structure of the survey items that produce similar results (Jordan and Troth, 2019 ). Harman's single factor test and a full collinearity approach were employed to ensure that the data was free from CMB (Tehseen et al., 2017 ; Jordan and Troth, 2019 ; Ali Qalati et al., 2021 ). Harman's single factor test showed a single factor explained only 22.8% of the total variance, which is far below the 50.0% acceptable threshold (Podsakoff et al., 2003 ).

Additionally, the variance inflation factor (VIF) was used, which is a measure of the amount of multicollinearity in a set of multiple regression constructs and also considered a way of detecting CMB (Hair et al., 2019 ). Hair et al. ( 2019 ) suggested that the acceptable threshold for the VIF is 3.0; as the computed VIFs for the present study ranged from 1.189 to 1.626, CMB is not a key concern (see Table 2 ). Bagozzi et al. ( 1991 ) suggested a correlation-matrix procedure to detect CMB. Common method bias is evident if correlation among the principle constructs is >0.9 (Tehseen et al., 2020 ); however, no values >0.9 were found in this study (see section Assessment of Measurement Model). This study used a two-step approach to evaluate the measurement model and the structural model.

Common method bias (full collinearity VIF).

Assessment of Measurement Model

Before conducting the SEM analysis, the measurement model was assessed to examine individual item reliability, internal consistency, and convergent and discriminant validity. Table 3 exhibits the values of outer loading used to measure an individual item's reliability (Hair et al., 2012 ). Hair et al. ( 2017 ) proposed that the value for each outer loading should be ≥0.7; following this principle, two items of phubbing (PHUB3—I get irritated if others ask me to get off my phone and talk to them; PHUB4—I use my phone even though I know it irritated others) were removed from the analysis Hair et al. ( 2019 ). According to Nunnally ( 1978 ), Cronbach's alpha values should exceed 0.7. The threshold values of constructs in this study ranged from 0.77 to 0.903. Regarding internal consistency, Bagozzi and Yi ( 1988 ) suggested that composite reliability (CR) should be ≥0.7. The coefficient value for CR in this study was between 0.857 and 0.928. Regarding convergent validity, Fornell and Larcker ( 1981 ) suggested that the average variance extracted (AVE) should be ≥0.5. Average variance extracted values in this study were between 0.60 and 0.811. Finally, regarding discriminant validity, according to Fornell and Larcker ( 1981 ), the square root of the AVE for each construct should exceed the inter-correlations of the construct with other model constructs. That was the case in this study, as shown in Table 4 .

Study measures, factor loading, and the constructs' reliability and convergent validity.

Discriminant validity and correlation.

Bold values are the square root of the AVE .

Hence, by analyzing the results of the measurement model, it can be concluded that the data are adequate for structural equation estimation.

Assessment of the Structural Model

This study used the PLS algorithm and a bootstrapping technique with 5,000 bootstraps as proposed by Hair et al. ( 2019 ) to generate the path coefficient values and their level of significance. The coefficient of determination ( R 2 ) is an important measure to assess the structural model and its explanatory power (Henseler et al., 2009 ; Hair et al., 2019 ). Table 5 and Figure 2 reveal that the R 2 value in the present study was 0.451 for psychological well-being, which means that 45.1% of changes in psychological well-being occurred due to social media use, social capital forms (i.e., bonding and bridging), social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing. Cohen ( 1998 ) proposed that R 2 values of 0.60, 0.33, and 0.19 are considered substantial, moderate, and weak. Following Cohen's ( 1998 ) threshold values, this research demonstrates a moderate predicting power for psychological well-being among Mexican respondents ( Table 6 ).

Summary of path coefficients and hypothesis testing.

Structural model.

Strength of the model (Predictive relevance, coefficient of determination, and model fit indices).

Goodness of fit → SRMR = 0.063; d_ULS = 1.589; d_G = 0.512; chi-square = 2,910.744 .

Apart from the R 2 measure, the present study also used cross-validated redundancy measures, or effect sizes ( q 2 ), to assess the proposed model and validate the results (Ringle et al., 2012 ). Hair et al. ( 2019 ) suggested that a model exhibiting an effect size q 2 > 0 has predictive relevance ( Table 6 ). This study's results evidenced that it has a 0.15 <0.29 <0.35 (medium) predictive relevance, as 0.02, 0.15, and 0.35 are considered small, medium, and large, respectively (Cohen, 1998 ). Regarding the goodness-of-fit indices, Hair et al. ( 2019 ) suggested the standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) to evaluate the goodness of fit. Standardized root mean square is an absolute measure of fit: a value of zero indicates perfect fit and a value <0.08 is considered good fit (Hair et al., 2019 ). This study exhibits an adequate model fitness level with an SRMR value of 0.063 ( Table 6 ).

Table 5 reveals that all hypotheses of the study were accepted base on the criterion ( p -value < 0.05). H1a (β = 0.332, t = 10.283, p = 0.001) was confirmed, with the second most robust positive and significant relationship (between social media use and bonding social capital). In addition, this study evidenced a positive and significant relationship between bonding social capital and psychological well-being (β = 0.127, t = 4.077, p = 0.001); therefore, H1b was accepted. Regarding social media use and bridging social capital, the present study found the most robust positive and significant impact (β = 0.439, t = 15.543, p = 0.001); therefore, H2a was accepted. The study also evidenced a positive and significant association between bridging social capital and psychological well-being (β = 0.561, t = 20.953, p = 0.001); thus, H2b was accepted. The present study evidenced a significant effect of social media use on social isolation (β = 0.145, t = 4.985, p = 0.001); thus, H3a was accepted. In addition, this study accepted H3b (β = −0.051, t = 2.01, p = 0.044). Furthermore, this study evidenced a positive and significant effect of social media use on smartphone addiction (β = 0.223, t = 6.241, p = 0.001); therefore, H4a was accepted. Furthermore, the present study found that smartphone addiction has a negative significant influence on psychological well-being (β = −0.068, t = 2.387, p = 0.017); therefore, H4b was accepted. Regarding the relationship between smartphone addiction and phubbing, this study found a positive and significant effect of smartphone addiction on phubbing (β = 0.244, t = 7.555, p = 0.001); therefore, H5 was accepted. Furthermore, the present research evidenced a positive and significant influence of phubbing on psychological well-being (β = 0.137, t = 4.938, p = 0.001); therefore, H6 was accepted. Finally, the study provides interesting findings on the indirect effect of social media use on psychological well-being ( t -value > 1.96 and p -value < 0.05); therefore, H7a–d were accepted.

Furthermore, to test the mediating analysis, Preacher and Hayes's ( 2008 ) approach was used. The key characteristic of an indirect relationship is that it involves a third construct, which plays a mediating role in the relationship between the independent and dependent constructs. Logically, the effect of A (independent construct) on C (the dependent construct) is mediated by B (a third variable). Preacher and Hayes ( 2008 ) suggested the following: B is a construct acting as a mediator if A significantly influences B, A significantly accounts for variability in C, B significantly influences C when controlling for A, and the influence of A on C decreases significantly when B is added simultaneously with A as a predictor of C. According to Matthews et al. ( 2018 ), if the indirect effect is significant while the direct insignificant, full mediation has occurred, while if both direct and indirect effects are substantial, partial mediation has occurred. This study evidenced that there is partial mediation in the proposed construct ( Table 5 ). Following Preacher and Hayes ( 2008 ) this study evidenced that there is partial mediation in the proposed construct, because the relationship between independent variable (social media use) and dependent variable (psychological well-being) is significant ( p -value < 0.05) and indirect effect among them after introducing mediator (bonding social capital, bridging social capital, social isolation, and smartphone addiction) is also significant ( p -value < 0.05), therefore it is evidenced that when there is a significant effect both direct and indirect it's called partial mediation.

The present study reveals that the social and psychological impacts of social media use among University students is becoming more complex as there is continuing advancement in technology, offering a range of affordable interaction opportunities. Based on the 940 valid responses collected, all the hypotheses were accepted ( p < 0.05).

H1a finding suggests that social media use is a significant influencing factor of bonding social capital. This implies that, during a pandemic, social media use enables students to continue their close relationships with family members, friends, and those with whom they have close ties. This finding is in line with prior work of Chan ( 2015 ) and Ellison et al. ( 2007 ), who evidenced that social bonding capital is predicted by Facebook use and having a mobile phone. H1b findings suggest that, when individuals believe that social communication can help overcome obstacles to interaction and encourage more virtual self-disclosure, social media use can improve trust and promote the establishment of social associations, thereby enhancing well-being. These findings are in line with those of Gong et al. ( 2021 ), who also witnessed the significant effect of bonding social capital on immigrants' psychological well-being, subsequently calling for the further evidence to confirm the proposed relationship.

The findings of the present study related to H2a suggest that students are more likely to use social media platforms to receive more emotional support, increase their ability to mobilize others, and to build social networks, which leads to social belongingness. Furthermore, the findings suggest that social media platforms enable students to accumulate and maintain bridging social capital; further, online classes can benefit students who feel shy when participating in offline classes. This study supports the previous findings of Chan ( 2015 ) and Karikari et al. ( 2017 ). Notably, the present study is not limited to a single social networking platform, taking instead a holistic view of social media. The H2b findings are consistent with those of Bano et al. ( 2019 ), who also confirmed the link between bonding social capital and psychological well-being among University students using WhatsApp as social media platform, as well as those of Chen and Li ( 2017 ).

The H3a findings suggest that, during the COVID-19 pandemic when most people around the world have had limited offline or face-to-face interaction and have used social media to connect with families, friends, and social communities, they have often been unable to connect with them. This is due to many individuals avoiding using social media because of fake news, financial constraints, and a lack of trust in social media; thus, the lack both of offline and online interaction, coupled with negative experiences on social media use, enhances the level of social isolation (Hajek and König, 2021 ). These findings are consistent with those of Adnan and Anwar ( 2020 ). The H3b suggests that higher levels of social isolation have a negative impact on psychological well-being. These result indicating that, consistent with Choi and Noh ( 2019 ), social isolation is negatively and significantly related to psychological well-being.

The H4a results suggests that substantial use of social media use leads to an increase in smartphone addiction. These findings are in line with those of Jeong et al. ( 2016 ), who stated that the excessive use of smartphones for social media, entertainment (watching videos, listening to music), and playing e-games was more likely to lead to smartphone addiction. These findings also confirm the previous work of Jeong et al. ( 2016 ), Salehan and Negahban ( 2013 ), and Swar and Hameed ( 2017 ). The H4b results revealed that a single unit increase in smartphone addiction results in a 6.8% decrease in psychological well-being. These findings are in line with those of Tangmunkongvorakul et al. ( 2019 ), who showed that students with higher levels of smartphone addiction had lower psychological well-being scores. These findings also support those of Shoukat ( 2019 ), who showed that smartphone addiction inversely influences individuals' mental health.

This suggests that the greater the smartphone addiction, the greater the phubbing. The H5 findings are in line with those of Chatterjee ( 2020 ), Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas ( 2016 ), Guazzini et al. ( 2019 ), and Tonacci et al. ( 2019 ), who also evidenced a significant impact of smartphone addiction and phubbing. Similarly, Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas ( 2018 ) corroborated that smartphone addiction is the main predictor of phubbing behavior. However, these findings are inconsistent with those of Vallespín et al. ( 2017 ), who found a negative influence of phubbing.

The H6 results suggests that phubbing is one of the significant predictors of psychological well-being. Furthermore, these findings suggest that, when phubbers use a cellphone during interaction with someone, especially during the current pandemic, and they are connected with many family members, friends, and relatives; therefore, this kind of action gives them more satisfaction, which simultaneously results in increased relaxation and decreased depression (Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2018 ). These findings support those of Davey et al. ( 2018 ), who evidenced that phubbing has a significant influence on adolescents and social health students in India.

The findings showed a significant and positive effect of social media use on psychological well-being both through bridging and bonding social capital. However, a significant and negative effect of social media use on psychological well-being through smartphone addiction and through social isolation was also found. Hence, this study provides evidence that could shed light on the contradictory contributions in the literature suggesting both positive (e.g., Chen and Li, 2017 ; Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ; Roberts and David, 2020 ) and negative (e.g., Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ) effects of social media use on psychological well-being. This study concludes that the overall impact is positive, despite some degree of negative indirect impact.

Theoretical Contributions

This study's findings contribute to the current literature, both by providing empirical evidence for the relationships suggested by extant literature and by demonstrating the relevance of adopting a more complex approach that considers, in particular, the indirect effect of social media on psychological well-being. As such, this study constitutes a basis for future research (Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ) aiming to understand the impacts of social media use and to find ways to reduce its possible negative impacts.

In line with Kim and Kim ( 2017 ), who stressed the importance of heterogeneous social networks in improving social capital, this paper suggests that, to positively impact psychological well-being, social media usage should be associated both with strong and weak ties, as both are important in building social capital, and hence associated with its bonding and bridging facets. Interestingly, though, bridging capital was shown as having the greatest impact on psychological well-being. Thus, the importance of wider social horizons, the inclusion in different groups, and establishing new connections (Putnam, 1995 , 2000 ) with heterogeneous weak ties (Li and Chen, 2014 ) are highlighted in this paper.

Practical Contributions

These findings are significant for practitioners, particularly those interested in dealing with the possible negative impacts of social media use on psychological well-being. Although social media use is associated with factors that negatively impact psychological well-being, particularly smartphone addiction and social isolation, these negative impacts can be lessened if the connections with both strong and weak ties are facilitated and featured by social media. Indeed, social media platforms offer several features, from facilitating communication with family, friends, and acquaintances, to identifying and offering access to other people with shared interests. However, it is important to access heterogeneous weak ties (Li and Chen, 2014 ) so that social media offers access to wider sources of information and new resources, hence enhancing bridging social capital.

Limitations and Directions for Future Studies

This study is not without limitations. For example, this study used a convenience sampling approach to reach to a large number of respondents. Further, this study was conducted in Mexico only, limiting the generalizability of the results; future research should therefore use a cross-cultural approach to investigate the impacts of social media use on psychological well-being and the mediating role of proposed constructs (e.g., bonding and bridging social capital, social isolation, and smartphone addiction). The sample distribution may also be regarded as a limitation of the study because respondents were mainly well-educated and female. Moreover, although Internet channels represent a particularly suitable way to approach social media users, the fact that this study adopted an online survey does not guarantee a representative sample of the population. Hence, extrapolating the results requires caution, and study replication is recommended, particularly with social media users from other countries and cultures. The present study was conducted in the context of mainly University students, primarily well-educated females, via an online survey on in Mexico; therefore, the findings represent a snapshot at a particular time. Notably, however, the effect of social media use is increasing due to COVID-19 around the globe and is volatile over time.

Two of the proposed hypotheses of this study, namely the expected negative impacts of social media use on social isolation and of phubbing on psychological well-being, should be further explored. One possible approach is to consider the type of connections (i.e., weak and strong ties) to explain further the impact of social media usage on social isolation. Apparently, the prevalence of weak ties, although facilitating bridging social capital, may have an adverse impact in terms of social isolation. Regarding phubbing, the fact that the findings point to a possible positive impact on psychological well-being should be carefully addressed, specifically by psychology theorists and scholars, in order to identify factors that may help further understand this phenomenon. Other suggestions for future research include using mixed-method approaches, as qualitative studies could help further validate the results and provide complementary perspectives on the relationships between the considered variables.

Data Availability Statement

Ethics statement.

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by Jiangsu University. The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

Author Contributions

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Funding. This study is supported by the National Statistics Research Project of China (2016LY96).

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Effects of social media use on psychological well-being: a mediated model.

• 1 School of Finance and Economics, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, China
• 2 Research Unit of Governance, Competitiveness, and Public Policies (GOVCOPP), Center for Economics and Finance (cef.up), School of Economics and Management, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
• 3 Department of Business Administration, Sukkur Institute of Business Administration (IBA) University, Sukkur, Pakistan
• 4 CETYS Universidad, Tijuana, Mexico
• 5 Department of Business Administration, Al-Quds University, Jerusalem, Israel
• 6 Business School, Shandong University, Weihai, China

The growth in social media use has given rise to concerns about the impacts it may have on users' psychological well-being. This paper's main objective is to shed light on the effect of social media use on psychological well-being. Building on contributions from various fields in the literature, it provides a more comprehensive study of the phenomenon by considering a set of mediators, including social capital types (i.e., bonding social capital and bridging social capital), social isolation, and smartphone addiction. The paper includes a quantitative study of 940 social media users from Mexico, using structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the proposed hypotheses. The findings point to an overall positive indirect impact of social media usage on psychological well-being, mainly due to the positive effect of bonding and bridging social capital. The empirical model's explanatory power is 45.1%. This paper provides empirical evidence and robust statistical analysis that demonstrates both positive and negative effects coexist, helping to reconcile the inconsistencies found so far in the literature.

Introduction

The use of social media has grown substantially in recent years ( Leong et al., 2019 ; Kemp, 2020 ). Social media refers to “the websites and online tools that facilitate interactions between users by providing them opportunities to share information, opinions, and interest” ( Swar and Hameed, 2017 , p. 141). Individuals use social media for many reasons, including entertainment, communication, and searching for information. Notably, adolescents and young adults are spending an increasing amount of time on online networking sites, e-games, texting, and other social media ( Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ). In fact, some authors (e.g., Dhir et al., 2018 ; Tateno et al., 2019 ) have suggested that social media has altered the forms of group interaction and its users' individual and collective behavior around the world.

Consequently, there are increased concerns regarding the possible negative impacts associated with social media usage addiction ( Swar and Hameed, 2017 ; Kircaburun et al., 2020 ), particularly on psychological well-being ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Smartphones sometimes distract their users from relationships and social interaction ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Li et al., 2020a ), and several authors have stressed that the excessive use of social media may lead to smartphone addiction ( Swar and Hameed, 2017 ; Leong et al., 2019 ), primarily because of the fear of missing out ( Reer et al., 2019 ; Roberts and David, 2020 ). Social media usage has been associated with anxiety, loneliness, and depression ( Dhir et al., 2018 ; Reer et al., 2019 ), social isolation ( Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ), and “phubbing,” which refers to the extent to which an individual uses, or is distracted by, their smartphone during face-to-face communication with others ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ).

However, social media use also contributes to building a sense of connectedness with relevant others ( Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ), which may reduce social isolation. Indeed, social media provides several ways to interact both with close ties, such as family, friends, and relatives, and weak ties, including coworkers, acquaintances, and strangers ( Chen and Li, 2017 ), and plays a key role among people of all ages as they exploit their sense of belonging in different communities ( Roberts and David, 2020 ). Consequently, despite the fears regarding the possible negative impacts of social media usage on well-being, there is also an increasing number of studies highlighting social media as a new communication channel ( Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ; Barbosa et al., 2020 ), stressing that it can play a crucial role in developing one's presence, identity, and reputation, thus facilitating social interaction, forming and maintaining relationships, and sharing ideas ( Carlson et al., 2016 ), which consequently may be significantly correlated to social support ( Chen and Li, 2017 ; Holliman et al., 2021 ). Interestingly, recent studies (e.g., David et al., 2018 ; Bano et al., 2019 ; Barbosa et al., 2020 ) have suggested that the impact of smartphone usage on psychological well-being depends on the time spent on each type of application and the activities that users engage in.

Hence, the literature provides contradictory cues regarding the impacts of social media on users' well-being, highlighting both the possible negative impacts and the social enhancement it can potentially provide. In line with views on the need to further investigate social media usage ( Karikari et al., 2017 ), particularly regarding its societal implications ( Jiao et al., 2017 ), this paper argues that there is an urgent need to further understand the impact of the time spent on social media on users' psychological well-being, namely by considering other variables that mediate and further explain this effect.

One of the relevant perspectives worth considering is that provided by social capital theory, which is adopted in this paper. Social capital theory has previously been used to study how social media usage affects psychological well-being (e.g., Bano et al., 2019 ). However, extant literature has so far presented only partial models of associations that, although statistically acceptable and contributing to the understanding of the scope of social networks, do not provide as comprehensive a vision of the phenomenon as that proposed within this paper. Furthermore, the contradictory views, suggesting both negative (e.g., Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ) and positive impacts ( Carlson et al., 2016 ; Chen and Li, 2017 ; Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ) of social media on psychological well-being, have not been adequately explored.

Given this research gap, this paper's main objective is to shed light on the effect of social media use on psychological well-being. As explained in detail in the next section, this paper explores the mediating effect of bonding and bridging social capital. To provide a broad view of the phenomenon, it also considers several variables highlighted in the literature as affecting the relationship between social media usage and psychological well-being, namely smartphone addiction, social isolation, and phubbing. The paper utilizes a quantitative study conducted in Mexico, comprising 940 social media users, and uses structural equation modeling (SEM) to test a set of research hypotheses.

This article provides several contributions. First, it adds to existing literature regarding the effect of social media use on psychological well-being and explores the contradictory indications provided by different approaches. Second, it proposes a conceptual model that integrates complementary perspectives on the direct and indirect effects of social media use. Third, it offers empirical evidence and robust statistical analysis that demonstrates that both positive and negative effects coexist, helping resolve the inconsistencies found so far in the literature. Finally, this paper provides insights on how to help reduce the potential negative effects of social media use, as it demonstrates that, through bridging and bonding social capital, social media usage positively impacts psychological well-being. Overall, the article offers valuable insights for academics, practitioners, and society in general.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section Literature Review presents a literature review focusing on the factors that explain the impact of social media usage on psychological well-being. Based on the literature review, a set of hypotheses are defined, resulting in the proposed conceptual model, which includes both the direct and indirect effects of social media usage on psychological well-being. Section Research Methodology explains the methodological procedures of the research, followed by the presentation and discussion of the study's results in section Results. Section Discussion is dedicated to the conclusions and includes implications, limitations, and suggestions for future research.

Literature Review

Putnam (1995 , p. 664–665) defined social capital as “features of social life – networks, norms, and trust – that enable participants to act together more effectively to pursue shared objectives.” Li and Chen (2014 , p. 117) further explained that social capital encompasses “resources embedded in one's social network, which can be assessed and used for instrumental or expressive returns such as mutual support, reciprocity, and cooperation.”

Putnam (1995 , 2000) conceptualized social capital as comprising two dimensions, bridging and bonding, considering the different norms and networks in which they occur. Bridging social capital refers to the inclusive nature of social interaction and occurs when individuals from different origins establish connections through social networks. Hence, bridging social capital is typically provided by heterogeneous weak ties ( Li and Chen, 2014 ). This dimension widens individual social horizons and perspectives and provides extended access to resources and information. Bonding social capital refers to the social and emotional support each individual receives from his or her social networks, particularly from close ties (e.g., family and friends).

Overall, social capital is expected to be positively associated with psychological well-being ( Bano et al., 2019 ). Indeed, Williams (2006) stressed that interaction generates affective connections, resulting in positive impacts, such as emotional support. The following sub-sections use the lens of social capital theory to explore further the relationship between the use of social media and psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Social Capital, and Psychological Well-Being

The effects of social media usage on social capital have gained increasing scholarly attention, and recent studies have highlighted a positive relationship between social media use and social capital ( Brown and Michinov, 2019 ; Tefertiller et al., 2020 ). Li and Chen (2014) hypothesized that the intensity of Facebook use by Chinese international students in the United States was positively related to social capital forms. A longitudinal survey based on the quota sampling approach illustrated the positive effects of social media use on the two social capital dimensions ( Chen and Li, 2017 ). Abbas and Mesch (2018) argued that, as Facebook usage increases, it will also increase users' social capital. Karikari et al. (2017) also found positive effects of social media use on social capital. Similarly, Pang (2018) studied Chinese students residing in Germany and found positive effects of social networking sites' use on social capital, which, in turn, was positively associated with psychological well-being. Bano et al. (2019) analyzed the 266 students' data and found positive effects of WhatsApp use on social capital forms and the positive effect of social capital on psychological well-being, emphasizing the role of social integration in mediating this positive effect.

Kim and Kim (2017) stressed the importance of having a heterogeneous network of contacts, which ultimately enhances the potential social capital. Overall, the manifest and social relations between people from close social circles (bonding social capital) and from distant social circles (bridging social capital) are strengthened when they promote communication, social support, and the sharing of interests, knowledge, and skills, which are shared with other members. This is linked to positive effects on interactions, such as acceptance, trust, and reciprocity, which are related to the individuals' health and psychological well-being ( Bekalu et al., 2019 ), including when social media helps to maintain social capital between social circles that exist outside of virtual communities ( Ellison et al., 2007 ).

Grounded on the above literature, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H1a: Social media use is positively associated with bonding social capital.

H1b: Bonding social capital is positively associated with psychological well-being.

H2a: Social media use is positively associated with bridging social capital.

H2b: Bridging social capital is positively associated with psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Social Isolation, and Psychological Well-Being

Social isolation is defined as “a deficit of personal relationships or being excluded from social networks” ( Choi and Noh, 2019 , p. 4). The state that occurs when an individual lacks true engagement with others, a sense of social belonging, and a satisfying relationship is related to increased mortality and morbidity ( Primack et al., 2017 ). Those who experience social isolation are deprived of social relationships and lack contact with others or involvement in social activities ( Schinka et al., 2012 ). Social media usage has been associated with anxiety, loneliness, and depression ( Dhir et al., 2018 ; Reer et al., 2019 ), and social isolation ( Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ). However, some recent studies have argued that social media use decreases social isolation ( Primack et al., 2017 ; Meshi et al., 2020 ). Indeed, the increased use of social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Twitter, among others, may provide opportunities for decreasing social isolation. For instance, the improved interpersonal connectivity achieved via videos and images on social media helps users evidence intimacy, attenuating social isolation ( Whaite et al., 2018 ).

Chappell and Badger (1989) stated that social isolation leads to decreased psychological well-being, while Choi and Noh (2019) concluded that greater social isolation is linked to increased suicide risk. Schinka et al. (2012) further argued that, when individuals experience social isolation from siblings, friends, family, or society, their psychological well-being tends to decrease. Thus, based on the literature cited above, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H3a: Social media use is significantly associated with social isolation.

H3b: Social isolation is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

Social Media Use, Smartphone Addiction, Phubbing, and Psychological Well-Being

Smartphone addiction refers to “an individuals' excessive use of a smartphone and its negative effects on his/her life as a result of his/her inability to control his behavior” ( Gökçearslan et al., 2018 , p. 48). Regardless of its form, smartphone addiction results in social, medical, and psychological harm to people by limiting their ability to make their own choices ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ). The rapid advancement of information and communication technologies has led to the concept of social media, e-games, and also to smartphone addiction ( Chatterjee, 2020 ). The excessive use of smartphones for social media use, entertainment (watching videos, listening to music), and playing e-games is more common amongst people addicted to smartphones ( Jeong et al., 2016 ). In fact, previous studies have evidenced the relationship between social use and smartphone addiction ( Salehan and Negahban, 2013 ; Jeong et al., 2016 ; Swar and Hameed, 2017 ). In line with this, the following hypotheses are proposed:

H4a: Social media use is positively associated with smartphone addiction.

H4b: Smartphone addiction is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

While smartphones are bringing individuals closer, they are also, to some extent, pulling people apart ( Tonacci et al., 2019 ). For instance, they can lead to individuals ignoring others with whom they have close ties or physical interactions; this situation normally occurs due to extreme smartphone use (i.e., at the dinner table, in meetings, at get-togethers and parties, and in other daily activities). This act of ignoring others is called phubbing and is considered a common phenomenon in communication activities ( Guazzini et al., 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Phubbing is also referred to as an act of snubbing others ( Chatterjee, 2020 ). This term was initially used in May 2012 by an Australian advertising agency to describe the “growing phenomenon of individuals ignoring their families and friends who were called phubbee (a person who is a recipients of phubbing behavior) victim of phubber (a person who start phubbing her or his companion)” ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2018 ). Smartphone addiction has been found to be a determinant of phubbing ( Kim et al., 2018 ). Other recent studies have also evidenced the association between smartphones and phubbing ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Guazzini et al., 2019 ; Tonacci et al., 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ). Vallespín et al. (2017 ) argued that phubbing behavior has a negative influence on psychological well-being and satisfaction. Furthermore, smartphone addiction is considered responsible for the development of new technologies. It may also negatively influence individual's psychological proximity ( Chatterjee, 2020 ). Therefore, based on the above discussion and calls for the association between phubbing and psychological well-being to be further explored, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H5: Smartphone addiction is positively associated with phubbing.

H6: Phubbing is negatively associated with psychological well-being.

Indirect Relationship Between Social Media Use and Psychological Well-Being

Beyond the direct hypotheses proposed above, this study investigates the indirect effects of social media use on psychological well-being mediated by social capital forms, social isolation, and phubbing. As described above, most prior studies have focused on the direct influence of social media use on social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing, as well as the direct impact of social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing on psychological well-being. Very few studies, however, have focused on and evidenced the mediating role of social capital forms, social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing derived from social media use in improving psychological well-being ( Chen and Li, 2017 ; Pang, 2018 ; Bano et al., 2019 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ). Moreover, little is known about smartphone addiction's mediating role between social media use and psychological well-being. Therefore, this study aims to fill this gap in the existing literature by investigating the mediation of social capital forms, social isolation, and smartphone addiction. Further, examining the mediating influence will contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of social media use on psychological well-being via the mediating associations of smartphone addiction and psychological factors. Therefore, based on the above, we propose the following hypotheses (the conceptual model is presented in Figure 1 ):

H7: (a) Bonding social capital; (b) bridging social capital; (c) social isolation; and (d) smartphone addiction mediate the relationship between social media use and psychological well-being.

Figure 1 . Conceptual model.

Research Methodology

Sample procedure and online survey.

This study randomly selected students from universities in Mexico. We chose University students for the following reasons. First, students are considered the most appropriate sample for e-commerce studies, particularly in the social media context ( Oghazi et al., 2018 ; Shi et al., 2018 ). Second, University students are considered to be frequent users and addicted to smartphones ( Mou et al., 2017 ; Stouthuysen et al., 2018 ). Third, this study ensured that respondents were experienced, well-educated, and possessed sufficient knowledge of the drawbacks of social media and the extreme use of smartphones. A total sample size of 940 University students was ultimately achieved from the 1,500 students contacted, using a convenience random sampling approach, due both to the COVID-19 pandemic and budget and time constraints. Additionally, in order to test the model, a quantitative empirical study was conducted, using an online survey method to collect data. This study used a web-based survey distributed via social media platforms for two reasons: the COVID-19 pandemic; and to reach a large number of respondents ( Qalati et al., 2021 ). Furthermore, online surveys are considered a powerful and authenticated tool for new research ( Fan et al., 2021 ), while also representing a fast, simple, and less costly approach to collecting data ( Dutot and Bergeron, 2016 ).

Data Collection Procedures and Respondent's Information

Data were collected by disseminating a link to the survey by e-mail and social network sites. Before presenting the closed-ended questionnaire, respondents were assured that their participation would remain voluntary, confidential, and anonymous. Data collection occurred from July 2020 to December 2020 (during the pandemic). It should be noted that, because data were collected during the pandemic, this may have had an influence on the results of the study. The reason for choosing a six-month lag time was to mitigate common method bias (CMB) ( Li et al., 2020b ). In the present study, 1,500 students were contacted via University e-mail and social applications (Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram). We sent a reminder every month for 6 months (a total of six reminders), resulting in 940 valid responses. Thus, 940 (62.6% response rate) responses were used for hypotheses testing.

Table 1 reveals that, of the 940 participants, three-quarters were female (76.4%, n = 719) and nearly one-quarter (23.6%, n = 221) were male. Nearly half of the participants (48.8%, n = 459) were aged between 26 and 35 years, followed by 36 to 35 years (21.9%, n = 206), <26 (20.3%, n = 191), and over 45 (8.9%, n = 84). Approximately two-thirds (65%, n = 611) had a bachelor's degree or above, while one-third had up to 12 years of education. Regarding the daily frequency of using the Internet, nearly half (48.6%, n = 457) of the respondents reported between 5 and 8 h a day, and over one-quarter (27.2%) 9–12 h a day. Regarding the social media platforms used, over 38.5 and 39.6% reported Facebook and WhatsApp, respectively. Of the 940 respondents, only 22.1% reported Instagram (12.8%) and Twitter (9.2%). It should be noted, however, that the sample is predominantly female and well-educated.

Table 1 . Respondents' characteristics.

Measurement Items

The study used five-point Likert scales (1 = “strongly disagree;” 5 = “strongly agree”) to record responses.

Social Media Use

Social media use was assessed using four items adapted from Karikari et al. (2017) . Sample items include “Social media is part of my everyday activity,” “Social media has become part of my daily life,” “I would be sorry if social media shut down,” and “I feel out of touch, when I have not logged onto social media for a while.” The adapted items had robust reliability and validity (CA = 783, CR = 0.857, AVE = 0.600).

Social Capital

Social capital was measured using a total of eight items, representing bonding social capital (four items) and bridging social capital (four items) adapted from Chan (2015) . Sample construct items include: bonging social capital (“I am willing to spend time to support general community activities,” “I interact with people who are quite different from me”) and bridging social capital (“My social media community is a good place to be,” “Interacting with people on social media makes me want to try new things”). The adapted items had robust reliability and validity [bonding social capital (CA = 0.785, CR = 0.861, AVE = 0.608) and bridging social capital (CA = 0.834, CR = 0.883, AVE = 0.601)].

Social Isolation

Social isolation was assessed using three items from Choi and Noh (2019) . Sample items include “I do not have anyone to play with,” “I feel alone from people,” and “I have no one I can trust.” This adapted scale had substantial reliability and validity (CA = 0.890, CR = 0.928, AVE = 0.811).

Smartphone Addiction

Smartphone addiction was assessed using five items taken from Salehan and Negahban (2013) . Sample items include “I am always preoccupied with my mobile,” “Using my mobile phone keeps me relaxed,” and “I am not able to control myself from frequent use of mobile phones.” Again, these adapted items showed substantial reliability and validity (CA = 903, CR = 0.928, AVE = 0.809).

Phubbing was assessed using four items from Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas (2018) . Sample items include: “I have conflicts with others because I am using my phone” and “I would rather pay attention to my phone than talk to others.” This construct also demonstrated significant reliability and validity (CA = 770, CR = 0.894, AVE = 0.809).

Psychological Well-Being

Psychological well-being was assessed using five items from Jiao et al. (2017) . Sample items include “I lead a purposeful and meaningful life with the help of others,” “My social relationships are supportive and rewarding in social media,” and “I am engaged and interested in my daily on social media.” This study evidenced that this adapted scale had substantial reliability and validity (CA = 0.886, CR = 0.917, AVE = 0.688).

Data Analysis

Based on the complexity of the association between the proposed construct and the widespread use and acceptance of SmartPLS 3.0 in several fields ( Hair et al., 2019 ), we utilized SEM, using SmartPLS 3.0, to examine the relationships between constructs. Structural equation modeling is a multivariate statistical analysis technique that is used to investigate relationships. Further, it is a combination of factor and multivariate regression analysis, and is employed to explore the relationship between observed and latent constructs.

SmartPLS 3.0 “is a more comprehensive software program with an intuitive graphical user interface to run partial least square SEM analysis, certainly has had a massive impact” ( Sarstedt and Cheah, 2019 ). According to Ringle et al. (2015) , this commercial software offers a wide range of algorithmic and modeling options, improved usability, and user-friendly and professional support. Furthermore, Sarstedt and Cheah (2019) suggested that structural equation models enable the specification of complex interrelationships between observed and latent constructs. Hair et al. (2019) argued that, in recent years, the number of articles published using partial least squares SEM has increased significantly in contrast to covariance-based SEM. In addition, partial least squares SEM using SmartPLS is more appealing for several scholars as it enables them to predict more complex models with several variables, indicator constructs, and structural paths, instead of imposing distributional assumptions on the data ( Hair et al., 2019 ). Therefore, this study utilized the partial least squares SEM approach using SmartPLS 3.0.

Common Method Bias (CMB) Test

This study used the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) test to measure the sampling adequacy and ensure data suitability. The KMO test result was 0.874, which is greater than an acceptable threshold of 0.50 ( Ali Qalati et al., 2021 ; Shrestha, 2021 ), and hence considered suitable for explanatory factor analysis. Moreover, Bartlett's test results demonstrated a significance level of 0.001, which is considered good as it is below the accepted threshold of 0.05.

The term CMB is associated with Campbell and Fiske (1959) , who highlighted the importance of CMB and identified that a portion of variance in the research may be due to the methods employed. It occurs when all scales of the study are measured at the same time using a single questionnaire survey ( Podsakoff and Organ, 1986 ); subsequently, estimates of the relationship among the variables might be distorted by the impacts of CMB. It is considered a serious issue that has a potential to “jeopardize” the validity of the study findings ( Tehseen et al., 2017 ). There are several reasons for CMB: (1) it mainly occurs due to response “tendencies that raters can apply uniformity across the measures;” and (2) it also occurs due to similarities in the wording and structure of the survey items that produce similar results ( Jordan and Troth, 2019 ). Harman's single factor test and a full collinearity approach were employed to ensure that the data was free from CMB ( Tehseen et al., 2017 ; Jordan and Troth, 2019 ; Ali Qalati et al., 2021 ). Harman's single factor test showed a single factor explained only 22.8% of the total variance, which is far below the 50.0% acceptable threshold ( Podsakoff et al., 2003 ).

Additionally, the variance inflation factor (VIF) was used, which is a measure of the amount of multicollinearity in a set of multiple regression constructs and also considered a way of detecting CMB ( Hair et al., 2019 ). Hair et al. (2019) suggested that the acceptable threshold for the VIF is 3.0; as the computed VIFs for the present study ranged from 1.189 to 1.626, CMB is not a key concern (see Table 2 ). Bagozzi et al. (1991) suggested a correlation-matrix procedure to detect CMB. Common method bias is evident if correlation among the principle constructs is >0.9 ( Tehseen et al., 2020 ); however, no values >0.9 were found in this study (see section Assessment of Measurement Model). This study used a two-step approach to evaluate the measurement model and the structural model.

Table 2 . Common method bias (full collinearity VIF).

Assessment of Measurement Model

Before conducting the SEM analysis, the measurement model was assessed to examine individual item reliability, internal consistency, and convergent and discriminant validity. Table 3 exhibits the values of outer loading used to measure an individual item's reliability ( Hair et al., 2012 ). Hair et al. (2017) proposed that the value for each outer loading should be ≥0.7; following this principle, two items of phubbing (PHUB3—I get irritated if others ask me to get off my phone and talk to them; PHUB4—I use my phone even though I know it irritated others) were removed from the analysis Hair et al. (2019) . According to Nunnally (1978) , Cronbach's alpha values should exceed 0.7. The threshold values of constructs in this study ranged from 0.77 to 0.903. Regarding internal consistency, Bagozzi and Yi (1988) suggested that composite reliability (CR) should be ≥0.7. The coefficient value for CR in this study was between 0.857 and 0.928. Regarding convergent validity, Fornell and Larcker (1981) suggested that the average variance extracted (AVE) should be ≥0.5. Average variance extracted values in this study were between 0.60 and 0.811. Finally, regarding discriminant validity, according to Fornell and Larcker (1981) , the square root of the AVE for each construct should exceed the inter-correlations of the construct with other model constructs. That was the case in this study, as shown in Table 4 .

Table 3 . Study measures, factor loading, and the constructs' reliability and convergent validity.

Table 4 . Discriminant validity and correlation.

Hence, by analyzing the results of the measurement model, it can be concluded that the data are adequate for structural equation estimation.

Assessment of the Structural Model

This study used the PLS algorithm and a bootstrapping technique with 5,000 bootstraps as proposed by Hair et al. (2019) to generate the path coefficient values and their level of significance. The coefficient of determination ( R 2 ) is an important measure to assess the structural model and its explanatory power ( Henseler et al., 2009 ; Hair et al., 2019 ). Table 5 and Figure 2 reveal that the R 2 value in the present study was 0.451 for psychological well-being, which means that 45.1% of changes in psychological well-being occurred due to social media use, social capital forms (i.e., bonding and bridging), social isolation, smartphone addiction, and phubbing. Cohen (1998) proposed that R 2 values of 0.60, 0.33, and 0.19 are considered substantial, moderate, and weak. Following Cohen's (1998) threshold values, this research demonstrates a moderate predicting power for psychological well-being among Mexican respondents ( Table 6 ).

Table 5 . Summary of path coefficients and hypothesis testing.

Figure 2 . Structural model.

Table 6 . Strength of the model (Predictive relevance, coefficient of determination, and model fit indices).

Apart from the R 2 measure, the present study also used cross-validated redundancy measures, or effect sizes ( q 2 ), to assess the proposed model and validate the results ( Ringle et al., 2012 ). Hair et al. (2019) suggested that a model exhibiting an effect size q 2 > 0 has predictive relevance ( Table 6 ). This study's results evidenced that it has a 0.15 <0.29 <0.35 (medium) predictive relevance, as 0.02, 0.15, and 0.35 are considered small, medium, and large, respectively ( Cohen, 1998 ). Regarding the goodness-of-fit indices, Hair et al. (2019) suggested the standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) to evaluate the goodness of fit. Standardized root mean square is an absolute measure of fit: a value of zero indicates perfect fit and a value <0.08 is considered good fit ( Hair et al., 2019 ). This study exhibits an adequate model fitness level with an SRMR value of 0.063 ( Table 6 ).

Table 5 reveals that all hypotheses of the study were accepted base on the criterion ( p -value < 0.05). H1a (β = 0.332, t = 10.283, p = 0.001) was confirmed, with the second most robust positive and significant relationship (between social media use and bonding social capital). In addition, this study evidenced a positive and significant relationship between bonding social capital and psychological well-being (β = 0.127, t = 4.077, p = 0.001); therefore, H1b was accepted. Regarding social media use and bridging social capital, the present study found the most robust positive and significant impact (β = 0.439, t = 15.543, p = 0.001); therefore, H2a was accepted. The study also evidenced a positive and significant association between bridging social capital and psychological well-being (β = 0.561, t = 20.953, p = 0.001); thus, H2b was accepted. The present study evidenced a significant effect of social media use on social isolation (β = 0.145, t = 4.985, p = 0.001); thus, H3a was accepted. In addition, this study accepted H3b (β = −0.051, t = 2.01, p = 0.044). Furthermore, this study evidenced a positive and significant effect of social media use on smartphone addiction (β = 0.223, t = 6.241, p = 0.001); therefore, H4a was accepted. Furthermore, the present study found that smartphone addiction has a negative significant influence on psychological well-being (β = −0.068, t = 2.387, p = 0.017); therefore, H4b was accepted. Regarding the relationship between smartphone addiction and phubbing, this study found a positive and significant effect of smartphone addiction on phubbing (β = 0.244, t = 7.555, p = 0.001); therefore, H5 was accepted. Furthermore, the present research evidenced a positive and significant influence of phubbing on psychological well-being (β = 0.137, t = 4.938, p = 0.001); therefore, H6 was accepted. Finally, the study provides interesting findings on the indirect effect of social media use on psychological well-being ( t -value > 1.96 and p -value < 0.05); therefore, H7a–d were accepted.

Furthermore, to test the mediating analysis, Preacher and Hayes's (2008) approach was used. The key characteristic of an indirect relationship is that it involves a third construct, which plays a mediating role in the relationship between the independent and dependent constructs. Logically, the effect of A (independent construct) on C (the dependent construct) is mediated by B (a third variable). Preacher and Hayes (2008) suggested the following: B is a construct acting as a mediator if A significantly influences B, A significantly accounts for variability in C, B significantly influences C when controlling for A, and the influence of A on C decreases significantly when B is added simultaneously with A as a predictor of C. According to Matthews et al. (2018) , if the indirect effect is significant while the direct insignificant, full mediation has occurred, while if both direct and indirect effects are substantial, partial mediation has occurred. This study evidenced that there is partial mediation in the proposed construct ( Table 5 ). Following Preacher and Hayes (2008) this study evidenced that there is partial mediation in the proposed construct, because the relationship between independent variable (social media use) and dependent variable (psychological well-being) is significant ( p -value < 0.05) and indirect effect among them after introducing mediator (bonding social capital, bridging social capital, social isolation, and smartphone addiction) is also significant ( p -value < 0.05), therefore it is evidenced that when there is a significant effect both direct and indirect it's called partial mediation.

The present study reveals that the social and psychological impacts of social media use among University students is becoming more complex as there is continuing advancement in technology, offering a range of affordable interaction opportunities. Based on the 940 valid responses collected, all the hypotheses were accepted ( p < 0.05).

H1a finding suggests that social media use is a significant influencing factor of bonding social capital. This implies that, during a pandemic, social media use enables students to continue their close relationships with family members, friends, and those with whom they have close ties. This finding is in line with prior work of Chan (2015) and Ellison et al. (2007) , who evidenced that social bonding capital is predicted by Facebook use and having a mobile phone. H1b findings suggest that, when individuals believe that social communication can help overcome obstacles to interaction and encourage more virtual self-disclosure, social media use can improve trust and promote the establishment of social associations, thereby enhancing well-being. These findings are in line with those of Gong et al. (2021) , who also witnessed the significant effect of bonding social capital on immigrants' psychological well-being, subsequently calling for the further evidence to confirm the proposed relationship.

The findings of the present study related to H2a suggest that students are more likely to use social media platforms to receive more emotional support, increase their ability to mobilize others, and to build social networks, which leads to social belongingness. Furthermore, the findings suggest that social media platforms enable students to accumulate and maintain bridging social capital; further, online classes can benefit students who feel shy when participating in offline classes. This study supports the previous findings of Chan (2015) and Karikari et al. (2017) . Notably, the present study is not limited to a single social networking platform, taking instead a holistic view of social media. The H2b findings are consistent with those of Bano et al. (2019) , who also confirmed the link between bonding social capital and psychological well-being among University students using WhatsApp as social media platform, as well as those of Chen and Li (2017) .

The H3a findings suggest that, during the COVID-19 pandemic when most people around the world have had limited offline or face-to-face interaction and have used social media to connect with families, friends, and social communities, they have often been unable to connect with them. This is due to many individuals avoiding using social media because of fake news, financial constraints, and a lack of trust in social media; thus, the lack both of offline and online interaction, coupled with negative experiences on social media use, enhances the level of social isolation ( Hajek and König, 2021 ). These findings are consistent with those of Adnan and Anwar (2020) . The H3b suggests that higher levels of social isolation have a negative impact on psychological well-being. These result indicating that, consistent with Choi and Noh (2019) , social isolation is negatively and significantly related to psychological well-being.

The H4a results suggests that substantial use of social media use leads to an increase in smartphone addiction. These findings are in line with those of Jeong et al. (2016) , who stated that the excessive use of smartphones for social media, entertainment (watching videos, listening to music), and playing e-games was more likely to lead to smartphone addiction. These findings also confirm the previous work of Jeong et al. (2016) , Salehan and Negahban (2013) , and Swar and Hameed (2017) . The H4b results revealed that a single unit increase in smartphone addiction results in a 6.8% decrease in psychological well-being. These findings are in line with those of Tangmunkongvorakul et al. (2019) , who showed that students with higher levels of smartphone addiction had lower psychological well-being scores. These findings also support those of Shoukat (2019) , who showed that smartphone addiction inversely influences individuals' mental health.

This suggests that the greater the smartphone addiction, the greater the phubbing. The H5 findings are in line with those of Chatterjee (2020) , Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas (2016) , Guazzini et al. (2019) , and Tonacci et al. (2019) , who also evidenced a significant impact of smartphone addiction and phubbing. Similarly, Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas (2018) corroborated that smartphone addiction is the main predictor of phubbing behavior. However, these findings are inconsistent with those of Vallespín et al. (2017 ), who found a negative influence of phubbing.

The H6 results suggests that phubbing is one of the significant predictors of psychological well-being. Furthermore, these findings suggest that, when phubbers use a cellphone during interaction with someone, especially during the current pandemic, and they are connected with many family members, friends, and relatives; therefore, this kind of action gives them more satisfaction, which simultaneously results in increased relaxation and decreased depression ( Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2018 ). These findings support those of Davey et al. (2018) , who evidenced that phubbing has a significant influence on adolescents and social health students in India.

The findings showed a significant and positive effect of social media use on psychological well-being both through bridging and bonding social capital. However, a significant and negative effect of social media use on psychological well-being through smartphone addiction and through social isolation was also found. Hence, this study provides evidence that could shed light on the contradictory contributions in the literature suggesting both positive (e.g., Chen and Li, 2017 ; Twenge and Campbell, 2019 ; Roberts and David, 2020 ) and negative (e.g., Chotpitayasunondh and Douglas, 2016 ; Jiao et al., 2017 ; Choi and Noh, 2019 ; Chatterjee, 2020 ) effects of social media use on psychological well-being. This study concludes that the overall impact is positive, despite some degree of negative indirect impact.

Theoretical Contributions

This study's findings contribute to the current literature, both by providing empirical evidence for the relationships suggested by extant literature and by demonstrating the relevance of adopting a more complex approach that considers, in particular, the indirect effect of social media on psychological well-being. As such, this study constitutes a basis for future research ( Van Den Eijnden et al., 2016 ; Whaite et al., 2018 ) aiming to understand the impacts of social media use and to find ways to reduce its possible negative impacts.

In line with Kim and Kim (2017) , who stressed the importance of heterogeneous social networks in improving social capital, this paper suggests that, to positively impact psychological well-being, social media usage should be associated both with strong and weak ties, as both are important in building social capital, and hence associated with its bonding and bridging facets. Interestingly, though, bridging capital was shown as having the greatest impact on psychological well-being. Thus, the importance of wider social horizons, the inclusion in different groups, and establishing new connections ( Putnam, 1995 , 2000 ) with heterogeneous weak ties ( Li and Chen, 2014 ) are highlighted in this paper.

Practical Contributions

These findings are significant for practitioners, particularly those interested in dealing with the possible negative impacts of social media use on psychological well-being. Although social media use is associated with factors that negatively impact psychological well-being, particularly smartphone addiction and social isolation, these negative impacts can be lessened if the connections with both strong and weak ties are facilitated and featured by social media. Indeed, social media platforms offer several features, from facilitating communication with family, friends, and acquaintances, to identifying and offering access to other people with shared interests. However, it is important to access heterogeneous weak ties ( Li and Chen, 2014 ) so that social media offers access to wider sources of information and new resources, hence enhancing bridging social capital.

Limitations and Directions for Future Studies

This study is not without limitations. For example, this study used a convenience sampling approach to reach to a large number of respondents. Further, this study was conducted in Mexico only, limiting the generalizability of the results; future research should therefore use a cross-cultural approach to investigate the impacts of social media use on psychological well-being and the mediating role of proposed constructs (e.g., bonding and bridging social capital, social isolation, and smartphone addiction). The sample distribution may also be regarded as a limitation of the study because respondents were mainly well-educated and female. Moreover, although Internet channels represent a particularly suitable way to approach social media users, the fact that this study adopted an online survey does not guarantee a representative sample of the population. Hence, extrapolating the results requires caution, and study replication is recommended, particularly with social media users from other countries and cultures. The present study was conducted in the context of mainly University students, primarily well-educated females, via an online survey on in Mexico; therefore, the findings represent a snapshot at a particular time. Notably, however, the effect of social media use is increasing due to COVID-19 around the globe and is volatile over time.

Two of the proposed hypotheses of this study, namely the expected negative impacts of social media use on social isolation and of phubbing on psychological well-being, should be further explored. One possible approach is to consider the type of connections (i.e., weak and strong ties) to explain further the impact of social media usage on social isolation. Apparently, the prevalence of weak ties, although facilitating bridging social capital, may have an adverse impact in terms of social isolation. Regarding phubbing, the fact that the findings point to a possible positive impact on psychological well-being should be carefully addressed, specifically by psychology theorists and scholars, in order to identify factors that may help further understand this phenomenon. Other suggestions for future research include using mixed-method approaches, as qualitative studies could help further validate the results and provide complementary perspectives on the relationships between the considered variables.

Data Availability Statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

Ethics Statement

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by Jiangsu University. The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

Author Contributions

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.

This study is supported by the National Statistics Research Project of China (2016LY96).

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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Keywords: smartphone addiction, social isolation, bonding social capital, bridging social capital, phubbing, social media use

Citation: Ostic D, Qalati SA, Barbosa B, Shah SMM, Galvan Vela E, Herzallah AM and Liu F (2021) Effects of Social Media Use on Psychological Well-Being: A Mediated Model. Front. Psychol. 12:678766. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.678766

Received: 10 March 2021; Accepted: 25 May 2021; Published: 21 June 2021.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2021 Ostic, Qalati, Barbosa, Shah, Galvan Vela, Herzallah and Liu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Sikandar Ali Qalati, sidqalati@gmail.com ; 5103180243@stmail.ujs.edu.cn ; Esthela Galvan Vela, esthela.galvan@cetys.mx

† ORCID: Dragana Ostic orcid.org/0000-0002-0469-1342 Sikandar Ali Qalati orcid.org/0000-0001-7235-6098 Belem Barbosa orcid.org/0000-0002-4057-360X Esthela Galvan Vela orcid.org/0000-0002-8778-3989 Feng Liu orcid.org/0000-0001-9367-049X

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

The French Journal of Media Studies

Accueil Numéros 5 Media and Diversity The Concept of Culture in Media S...

The Concept of Culture in Media Studies: A Critical Review of Academic Literature

This study examines the way culture has been researched in media studies and suggests how critical intercultural communication could contribute to the field. A literature review was conducted and articles (N=114) published in peer-reviewed journals between 2003 and 2013 were collected. Results show that studies dealing with media and culture do not systematically define the concept of culture. Findings also indicate that culture is oftentimes taken for granted instead of being problematized and addressed as a source of struggle. Advantages of using a critical intercultural communication framework to examine culture are discussed.

Entrées d’index

Keywords: , texte intégral.

• 1 Debra L. Merskin, Media, Minorities, and Meaning: A Critical Introduction (New York: Peter Lang Pub (...)
• 2 Robert M. Entman, “Framing Bias: Media in the Distribution of Power,” Journal of Communication 57, (...)
• 3 Sari Pietikäinen and Helen Kelly-Holmes, “The Dangers of Normativity – The Case of Minority Languag (...)
• 4 Isabelle Rigoni, “Intersectionality and Mediated Cultural Production in A Globalized Post-Colonial (...)

1 Recent directions in the field of media studies have turned culture into a significant object of study. Strong emphasis has been put on representations of minorities in media 1 and their potential biases, 2 minority-language media 3 and ethnic media. 4 However, the increasing attention given to culture has not gone hand in hand with an overall clarification of the concept itself. Defining culture remains a difficult exercise, especially because of its multifaceted nature. The importance of the concept in media studies and its blurry theoretical grounds highlight the need to look back at how it has been used in studies. The present article is built around three main questions. First, it looks at how culture has been researched in media studies . Second, it examines possible limitations of these approaches. Third, it investigates ways in which a critical intercultural communication framework can be beneficial to media studies dealing with culture. For this purpose, this study explores recent academic discourse on media and culture by reviewing studies dealing with issues of cultural diversity, representations of culture, and discourse of culture. In addition to examining approaches to culture and their potential limitations, this article also presents ways in which critical intercultural communication can be used by researchers from different disciplines interested in culture.

2 This article starts by presenting some of the main arguments raised in discussing the use and conceptualization of culture. The way critical intercultural communication contributes to this discussion is presented, followed by reasons why it can be a relevant framework for media studies. This article then looks at previous reviews of academic discourse, especially focusing on the fields of communication and media. Methods for collecting data are detailed before discussing the findings and main implications of this study .

The Concept of Culture

• 5 Robert Brightman, “Forget Culture: Replacement, Transcendence, Relexification,” Cultural Anthropolo (...)
• 6 William H. Sewell Jr, “The Concept(s) of Culture,” in Practicing History: New Directions in Histori (...)
• 7 Ingrid Piller, Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Universit (...)
• 9 Fred Dervin, “Approches dialogiques et énonciatives de l’interculturel : Pour une didactique des la (...)
• 10 Fred Dervin, “A Plea for Change in Research on Intercultural Discourses: A “Liquid” Approach to the (...)
• 11 Sylvie Poirier, “La (dé)politisation de la culture? Réflexions sur un concept pluriel, ” Anthropolog (...)
• 12 Ryuko Kubota, “Critical Approaches to Intercultural Discourse and Communication,” in The Handbook o (...)

3 Culture is a concept that has been discussed extensively, giving rise to multiple approaches and uses of the term across fields of study. As the concept of culture became increasingly important and pervasive, it also became increasingly questioned. Across different fields of studies, scholars discuss whether to keep, change or altogether discard the concept of culture. Brightman brought together some of the main criticisms addressed to culture. 5 His work reveals the variety of arguments used against the concept and the lack of convergence on how to revise it or what to use instead. Sewell also goes through some of the cornerstone issues in conceptualizing culture. 6 The first distinction he mentions, and which he argues is not always explicitly made by researchers, is the one between the use of culture and cultures . The singular use refers to the theoretical approach used for research while the plural use refers to the object of study . Culture is used in contrast to other academic disciplines or analytical tools (e.g. politics, economics) whereas cultures is used when examining different forms of culture and is therefore more concrete (e.g. regional culture, hipster culture). Another distinction which has had a strong impact on the study of culture is the understanding of culture as practice or culture as a system of symbols and meanings . Critical intercultural scholars regard culture as a discursive construction, emphasizing the role played by individuals in performing culture. Inherited from constructionism, this approach emphasizes culture as something people do rather than something people have. 7 Regarding culture as practice is the dominant approach in critical intercultural communication, which tends to be used in opposition to culture as a system of symbols and meanings. This latter approach to culture is often associated with essentialist and positivist views that describe culture as an identifiable and fixed item. 8 Essentialist views of culture have been criticized for pinpointing aspects of cultures (typically reduced to the idea of national cultures) and presenting such characteristics as truths rather than constructions. 9 On the other hand, critical intercultural scholars argue for an approach to culture that is largely embedded within social constructionism. 10 Such an approach emphasizes culture as constructed, political, intertwined with ethics 11 and related to power both within and between societies. 12 From that perspective, culture is understood to be situated rather than objective, and ever changing as opposed to stable.

• 13 Stuart Hall, “Introduction,” in Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices , (...)

14 Shi-Xu, A Cultural Approach to Discourse (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 1–13.

• 15 William A. Gamson and Andre Modigliani, “Media discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Con (...)
• 16 Nancy K. Rivenburgh, “Media Framing of Complex Issues: The Case of Endangered Languages,” Public Un (...)
• 17 Ulrika Olausson, “Global warming – Global Responsibility? Media Frames of Collective Action and Sci (...)

4 As Hall stresses, culture is about meaning and as such “permeates all of society.” 13 Representations, practices, values and identities have cultural meanings that are discursively constructed and tap into previous cultural discourses to be meaningful. Critical intercultural communication casts light on ways in which meanings echo cultural knowledge and are therefore difficult to identify and question – even for researchers themselves, hence a strong emphasis placed on reflexivity. 14 The importance of “cultural resonance” has also been pointed out by scholars examining media frames. 15 Rivenburgh stresses the way “media frames that reflect cultural common sense, values, or ideology are both instinctually employed by journalists and easily accepted by the public”. 16 Tapping into cultural resonance may be done consciously or out of habit by journalists and editors who see their cultural environment as natural. The use of culturally resonant frames in media discourse increases their taken-for-grantedness, which enhances their power. Cultural markers create a sense of common sense because of their presence in everyday life experiences which contributes to normalizing them, making them “well-nigh impossible to recognize, question, or resist”. 17 The emphasis that critical intercultural communication puts on culture as having the propensity to normalize representations and practices thus appears especially relevant to media studies.

• 18 Marianne Jørgensen and Louise J. Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method (London: Sage Pu (...)

19 Chris Barker, The Sage Dictionary of Cultural Studies (London: Sage Publications, 2004), 64–65.

5 Another aspect where interests of both disciplines meet is the extent to which discursive practices can be ethnocentric. To different extents, critical scholars agree on the idea that discourses construct the way societies represent themselves. 18 Media discourse is probably one of the discursive practices most often cited as constitutive of people’s worldviews, representations of themselves and others. One question put forward by critical intercultural communication is the extent to which such discourses rely on ethnocentric representations. Ethnocentrism refers to people’s tendency to use the standards of their own culture to judge other cultural groups, which is concurrent with people’s tendency to regard their culture as superior to others. 19 Ethnocentrism thus refers to the way cultural standards can pass as implicit norms for people identifying with that culture. As much emphasis is now put on ethnic media, cultural diversity and the effects of globalization on developing transnational media spaces, it is important not to overlook the extent to which national media discourse can still be limited and convey ethnocentric representations. The emphasis put on ethnocentrism in media has strong practical implications for professionals and audiences by encouraging them to be more critical towards news content.

Examining Academic Discourse

• 20 Keith V. Erickson, Cathy A. Fleuriet and Lawrence A. Hosman, “Prolific Publishing: Professional and (...)
• 21 Michael W. Kramer, Jon A. Hess and Loren D. Reid, “Trends in Communication Scholarship: An Analysis (...)

22 Jørgensen and Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method , 175–177.

• 23 Maggie MacLure, Discourses in Educational and Social Research ( Buckingham: Open University Press, 2 (...)

6 Conferences and publications are the main venues for academics to discuss the latest developments and findings from all disciplines. Nowadays, academic debate mostly takes place in journals, whose number has kept on increasing throughout the last decades. 20 It is through these journals that most ideas are expressed, hence the importance of examining their content. Publishing is central for scholars, not only as a way of contributing to the development of their fields of study but also to the development of their career. The notorious “publish or perish” phrase provides an efficient summary of what publications nowadays represent in the academic world. 21 As journal articles have become the main venue for academic discourse, they have also turned into common and natural venues. Such development can be problematic if academic discourse comes to be granted too much legitimacy instead of having its status, form and content constantly challenged. Like other discursive practices, journal articles create and validate certain meanings that progressively become the norm and can, as such, easily pass as natural instead of constructed and contingent. 22 Knowledge expressed in academic discourse is therefore not objective but is, like any other form of knowledge, “‘situated’ – that is, produced by and for particular interests, in particular circumstances, at particular times”. 23 Reflexivity, a central ethical component of research, is therefore especially important when looking at academic discourse as a whole.

• 24 Ronald D. Gordon, “Beyond the Failures of Western Communication Theory,” Journal of Multicultural D (...)
• 25 Molefi Kete Asante, “The Ideological Significance of Afrocentricity in Intercultural Communication, (...)
• 26 Yoshitaka Miike, “Non-Western Theory in Western research? An Asiacentric Agenda for Asian Communica (...)
• 27 Yoshitaka Miike, “An Asiacentric Reflection on Eurocentric Bias in Communication Theory,” Communica (...)

28 Asante, “The Ideological Significance of Afrocentricity in Intercultural Communication,” 10.

• 29 Shi-Xu, “Reconstructing Eastern Paradigms of Discourse Studies ,” Journal of Multicultural Discourse (...)
• 30 Hui-Ching Chang, Rich Holt and Lina Luo, “Representing East Asians in Intercultural Communication T (...)
• 31 Molefi Kete Asante, Afrocentricity: The Theory of Social Change (Chicago: African American Images, (...)
• 32 Ella Shohat and Robert Stam, Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the Media (London: Routl (...)
• 33 Eric Kit-Wai Ma, “Rethinking Media Studies: The Case of China,” in De-westernizing Media Studies , e (...)

7 Recently, increasing attention has been paid to cultural bias in academic discourse. Some scholars especially criticize the general lack of attention paid to such bias. Gordon, for instance, has looked at communication theories, which he describes as an example of a Western-oriented or Eurocentric approach to research. 24 Gordon highlights the way communication theories have typically been elaborated by Caucasian researchers from the United States who mostly used university students as participants. Western-oriented theories have been criticized for being taken as universally valid despite being anchored in European academic traditions, especially the heritage of the Enlightenment period. In response, some scholars have suggested using different approaches. Asante has, for instance, put forth Afrocentricity as an ideological and methodological approach to conduct research from an African standpoint. 25 Similarly, Miike encourages using Asiacentricity to examine Asian contexts from an Asian perspective. 26 Miike details ways in which the concept of “communication” is defined differently by Asiacentric and Eurocentric approaches, as different aspects and outcomes are emphasized. 27 Afrocentricity and Asiacentricity illustrate ongoing efforts to diversify analytical tools that would help research human activity and capture its plurality. These approaches are meant to open up new perspectives in research by providing scholars with different outlooks on their objects of study. For some scholars, developing new approaches is also meant to create legitimate alternatives to Western theories. Back in 1983, Asante, for instance, pointed out the difficulty for some African scholars to be published in Eurocentric journals because of their different, and non-valued, academic tradition. 28 Shi-Xu advocates the emergence of various academic paradigms that would work “as equal but distinctive interlocutors” and help “redress this cultural imbalance”. 29 However, other voices among academics are more reserved when it comes to developing culture-specific approaches, fearing that it will only turn the problem around instead of solving it. Chang, Holt and Luo raise the question as they discuss Asiacentricity: “If every version of a cultural writing of other is at the same time also the construction of self , might our call for an Asiacentric perspective in explaining communication not fall into the same trap as the often-blamed Eurocentric perspective? Might the reversal of the situation – prioritizing Asians – encounter the same predicament?” 30 Supporters of culture-specific approaches, however, embrace this criticism. From their perspective, culture-specific approaches are beneficial because they are explicitly situated and do not try to reach universal validity. They point out that it is not so much Western-oriented theories being biased and situated that triggered critics as the lack of reflexivity about these limitations. 31 Similar debates are also taking place among media scholars, with issues of “de-Westernizing” media studies being increasingly discussed. 32 Critics claim that Western-oriented media theories are too limited as they are based on European and North American political, economic and media models. Looking specifically at China, Ma argues for a compromise. 33 He questions the benefits of new theories that would risk “essentializing and exoticizing the Asian experience” and proposes adjusting existing theories to fit the Chinese context.

Methods and Results

8 A literature review was conducted in fall 2013 using the academic search engines EBSCO and Web of Science. The keywords “media representation”, “media discourse”, “diversity”, and “cultur*” (the asterisk was used to include other possible endings in the data search) were used to collect peer-reviewed articles published in English between 2003 and 2013. Only articles dealing with issues of cultural diversity and media were included. Some articles in which culture was understood from an agricultural perspective were, for instance, left out. The search was ended once saturation was reached, that is when the same keywords used in different search engines brought up the same articles. In total, 114 articles were collected and reviewed for the purpose of this study. The literature review was conducted inductively and kept as open as possible. The search was not limited to any specific journals because the scope of topics covered by media studies on cultural diversity was expected to be very wide. One aim of this literature review being to see what types of issues were encompassed, it would have been detrimental to limit the search to certain journals.

• 34 See for example Gordon, “Beyond the Failures of Western Communication Theory,” and Miike, “An Asiac (...)
• 35 Annelies Verdoolaege, “Media representations of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commissi (...)
• 36 Jawad Syed, “The Representation of Cultural Diversity in Urdu-Language Newspapers in Pakistan: A St (...)
• 37 Yasmin Jiwani, “War Talk Engendering Terror: Race, Gender and Representation in Canadian Print Medi (...)
• 38 Fabienne Darling-Wolf, “Sites of Attractiveness: Japanese Women and Westernized Representations of (...)
• 39 Maria Andrea Dos Santos Soares, “Look, Blackness in Brazil!: Disrupting the Grotesquerie of Racial (...)
• 40 Anna Bredström, “Gendered Racism and the Production Of Cultural Difference: Media Representations a (...)
• 41 Shanara Rose Reid-Brinkley, “Ghetto Kids Gone Good: Race, Representation, and Authority in the Scri (...)

9 Short descriptions were written about each article to describe their content, which later helped identify recurrent themes, similar approaches and unusual topics. Articles were collected within a 10-year time frame in order to get an overall picture of the state of recent research. No particular evolution or trends were noticed, however, regarding approaches or topics tackled. Oftentimes, authors used eclectic theoretical and/or methodological approaches that, for instance, combined cultural studies and critical discourse analysis (CDA) or feminist theories and CDA. Among studies that explicitly presented their theoretical and/or methodological frameworks, CDA (9%), feminist theories (10%) and cultural/critical frameworks relying on Foucault’s, Gramsci’s or Hall’s theories (29%) were recurrent approaches. As regards analytical tools from journalism or media studies, results indicated that framing theory (10%) was often used as opposed to gatekeeping or agenda-setting theory (2%). Similarly to results from previous reviews of academic discourse, 34 studies from this data set appeared to be mainly conducted from a Western-oriented perspective. This was the case even for strongly situated studies that focused on particular cultures and were published in specific journals. For instance, the article “Media Representations of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Their Commitment to Reconciliation” 35 was published in the Journal of African Cultural Studies using CDA, and the article “The Representation of Cultural Diversity in Urdu-Language Newspapers in Pakistan: A Study of Jang and Nawaiwaqt” 36 was published in the South Asia Journal of South Asian Studies and used Hodder’s approach. In comparison, articles looking at representations of women were found to use various trends of feminist theories such as standpoint theory, 37 postcolonial theory 38 and black feminism. 39 Similarly, articles explicitly dealing with race, for instance, used postcolonial theory 40 and Jackson’s (2006) theory of scripting and media framing of black bodies. 41

42 Kathryn Woodward, Identity and Difference (London: Sage Publications, 1997), 35.

10 As regards the scope of topics tackled, results indicated that the majority of articles investigated representation of minorities in the media (67%), most often dealing with ethnic or religious groups. Articles within this category oftentimes raised the issue of media stereotyping and othering minorities. That is, studies investigated ways in which media discourse sometimes supports the construction of minorities as “Others”, which can emphasize differences between groups and convey negative stereotypical representations. 42 Among articles exploring representations of minorities, several studies dealt with sport and representations of athletes (8%). A significant number of studies examined discourses of diversity (23%), with some focusing exclusively on European discourses of diversity (3%). Other studies investigated what diversity stands for in the media and how it can be approached by newsrooms. On the other hand, some topics appeared to be scarcely tackled, which was the case of foreign-news coverage (4%), newsroom diversity (2%) or integration and acculturation issues (2%). Regarding the type of media investigated, the majority of studies examined newspapers and television (70%), while entertainment and advertisement (19%) were less considered.

Culture: Between Main Focus and Transparent Background

11 Despite explicitly dealing with culture, many articles did not provide a clear definition of the term. Nor did many researchers position themselves as regards the different schools of thought on culture. Instances of culture taken for granted particularly occurred in the literature when (1) culture was associated with nations or (2) the so-called Western world, or (3) when the concepts of race or ethnicity were used.

43 Michael Billig, Banal Nationalism (London: Sage Publications, 1995), 6.

• 44 Rona T. Halualani, S. Lily Mendoza and Jolanta A. Drzewiecka, “‘Critical’” Junctures in Intercultur (...)

12 Results from the literature review conducted for this study indicate the recurrent association of culture with that of nation. However, the use of countries as cultural contexts and embodiments of cultures can be problematic for several reasons. A main pitfall is the homogeneous and reduced picture of culture that it conveys. Culture is a multilayered notion and reducing it to the single aspect of nationality can be detrimental to both the idea of nation and culture. Nations are multicultural, in the literal meaning of the word: that is, made out of multiple cultures. Studies that use nation as the unit of reference to talk about culture, language and identity tend to homogenize national cultures and therefore increase chances of being stereotypical instead of deconstructing stereotypes. A second important drawback is the way national culture tends to be presented as normal instead of artificial. This contributes to discourses of “banal nationalism” where individuals are brought up with the idea that the world is divided between nations. 43 It also overlooks the fact that culture is constructed and thus intertwined with power and struggle. When culture is understood as the equivalent of nation, it typically hints at the culture of the dominant group within that nation. Such representation leaves out or even marginalizes other forms of culture within that country, therefore maintaining existing hierarchy instead of deconstructing it. Halualani, Mendoza and Drzewiecka point out the danger of blurring the lines between the concepts of culture and nation: “To accept cultures as nations as inherently and naturally truthful and accurate at a surface level would be to risk reproducing external framings of cultural groups advanced by colonialist governments, dominant nationalist parties, and ruling power interests that benefit from such ‘status quo’ thinking.” 44

45 Piller, Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction , 66–69.

46 Dervin, “A Plea For Change in Research on Intercultural Discourses,” 41.

13 Associating culture to nation thus tends to sustain hierarchy between cultural practices and those who practice or identify to them. By maintaining hierarchical order between cultures, the nation approach implicitly contributes to preserving the persistent dichotomy between “us” and “them”, whether within or between nations. The nation approach to culture is tightly related to essentialist views of culture in that it provides a static and homogeneous picture of culture. Essentialism regards culture as a one-dimensional concept and therefore leaves out issues of race, religion, gender, social status and larger historical and political structures. Critical intercultural communication endeavors to go beyond such limitations by taking into account the multidimensional, constructed, contingent and dynamic facets of culture. The critical intercultural communication approach does not dismiss nations as possible instances of cultures. However, it focuses on exploring which representations of culture and nation are associated, through which processes, and whether such associations vary in time or depending on the context. Critical intercultural scholars emphasize culture as raising questions rather than providing answers that would help predict people’s behaviors. 45 Through its conceptualization of culture, a critical intercultural communication framework helps focus on ways in which people construct their sense of cultural belonging and identity. 46 This approach is relevant to media studies in many ways. It is strongly related to research exploring the relation individuals make between their media consumption and their identity, or research dealing with the way media discourse is intertwined with discourses of (national) identity. The emphasis put on constructing cultural identity and belonging can also help focus on who is represented as “belonging” and who is not, which is a significant aspect of studies on minority media and cultural diversity.

• 47 Malcom D. Brown, “Comparative Analysis of Mainstream Discourses, Media Narratives and Representatio (...)
• 48 Margarida Carvalho, “The Construction of the Image of Immigrants and Ethnic Minorities in Two Portu (...)

14 As mentioned beforehand, results indicated that culture can be taken for granted when it is about “us”. In many cases, “our” culture is used as a background for research, making it look normal and neutral. “Our” culture also appears homogeneous because examining diversity oftentimes consists of examining the “Other”. For instance, the article entitled “Comparative Analysis of Mainstream Discourses, Media Narratives and Representations of Islam in Britain and France Prior to 9/11” examines the construction of Islam, notably referring to the switch from exoticism before 9/11 to terrorism afterwards. 47 The article, however, does not discuss the construction of “British” and “French” but uses them as taken-for-granted cultural representations. Similarly, the article “The Construction of the Image of Immigrants and Ethnic Minorities in two Portuguese Daily Newspapers” discusses the way “their” image is fabricated and thus artificial but does not discuss the construction of the “Portuguese” identity. 48 Of course, focusing on minorities’ identities is highly relevant, but it could be beneficial to consider both majorities’ and minorities’ identities and cultures. Such an approach could help examine diversity among “us” rather than embodied only by “them”. Examining both majority and minority could enable researchers to go beyond this dichotomous opposition and not only look at differences but also cast light on shared cultural representations, practices or identities. Looking at differences and similarities, as well as how those are negotiated, can also help examine the way cultural meanings and identities are constructed in relation to one another. Overall, it would be a way to put all cultural practices and representations on an equal footing by explicitly defining them as constructed and contingent. This could in turn contribute to challenge taken-for-granted perceptions we have of ourselves as well as of others.

49 Anthony P. Browne, “Denying Race in the American and French Context,” Wadabagei 12 (2009): 83.

15 Findings also indicate that the concept of culture tends to be used in different ways depending on whose culture is examined. The “us” is often associated with nationality and presented as legitimate, neutral, acultural, aethnical and aracial while the “them” is often referred to in terms of religious or ethnic denominations. Oftentimes, culture is not directly problematized when the concepts of race and ethnicity are used. Eventually, this paints a picture where “we” seem to be acultural and unproblematic while “they” are described in terms of struggle, race, ethnicity or religious affiliations. The imbalance in such representations is problematic in that it reproduces stereotypical representations of minorities even though most studies intend to deconstruct them. Using alternatives to Western and Eurocentric approaches in media studies could help dismiss such a vicious circle. Enhancing geographical diversity as regards research location could also encourage study of various minority groups. Indeed, findings suggest that numerous studies are located in Europe, North America or Australia: parts of the world that embody the idea of “Western culture”. The lack of diversity in the location of research is a strong shortcoming of academic discourse, especially when it examines representation of minorities. Going through numerous articles dealing with ethnic or religious minorities living in the so-called Western world nourishes the idea that majority and dominant groups are white Europeans while struggling minorities are black, Asians or Muslims. Using a critical intercultural communication framework can discourage researchers from using or describing, even implicitly, certain groups or practices as acultural and neutral and others as only racial or ethnic. This issue has also been raised by scholars working on colorblind ideology. Browne, for instance, argues that in both the United States and France, being white is “the invisible norm against which all other cultural and racial groups are defined and subordinated”. 49 The notion of invisible norm raised by Browne is particularly relevant when it comes to seeing oneself as aracial or acultural and seeing others mostly through their skin color, religious affiliations or cultural practices. The way concepts of race and ethnicity can sometimes be used instead of the one of culture conveys the idea that they refer to different aspects. Nevertheless, race and ethnicity are forms of culture, as gender, nationality or social class can also be. Dismissing culture and using only race and ethnicity can be a drawback in that it contributes to presenting culture as unproblematic and natural, while race and ethnicity are sources of struggle. Using a critical intercultural communication framework is a way to be inclusive and critically tackle all aspects of culture. Bridging the gap between culture, race and ethnicity is also a way to bring together schools of thought (for instance, scholars from the United States and scholars from Europe) that have different stances on the concept of race itself. Examining critically the way race, ethnicity, social status, religious, sexual and gender identities are constructed and conveyed can thus enrich our understanding of culture. Generally speaking, using a critical approach to the concept of culture would help address problematic representations of minority/majority and us/them in academic discourse. Understanding culture as a construction that involves power relations and struggle contributes to include every individual, group and practice, since all aspects and members of societies are cultural. This therefore takes away the pervasive and implicit idea that some people or practices are neutral to some extent. Reflexivity is a central component in order to be able to detach oneself from ethnocentric representations and look at oneself, one’s culture, practices and values as cultural and therefore constructed and ideological. Focusing on cultural identity as constructed is also an asset in decreasing ethnocentrism or cultural bias in academic discourse. Encouraging researchers to be reflexive about their cultural backgrounds can help them problematize what they could otherwise take for granted about their own cultural identities and belongings. As Rorty points out, no one is ahistorical or acultural and therefore “everybody is ethnocentric when engaged in actual debate”. 50 The best way to overcome ethnocentric representations is to make them and the way they are constructed salient. Ethnocentrism in academic discourse is particularly problematic because research aims at being, if not entirely unbiased, at least critical towards its inherent subjectivity. Ethnocentrism as a form of bias is difficult to overcome if not addressed directly. Researchers should therefore aim at being critical towards their personal background as well as their philosophical, theoretical and methodological heritage. Cultural baggage has to be reflected upon at the individual level, that is, in the way personal choices affect the way researchers tackle a topic or analyze data, but also at the academic level, that is, the way they can be blind to the overall schools of thought to which they belong.

16 The concept of culture is regarded by many as ambiguous, difficult to conceptualize, and even non-operational by some scholars. In spite of its difficult reputation, culture remains a prominent object of study. Influences from critical theories and social constructionism make critical intercultural communication a relevant framework for examining representations and discursive constructions of culture. The premise that culture is constructed provides a solid ground to examine ways in which certain representations seem more powerful or natural than others. It also emphasizes the fact that we live in webs of cultural discourses – some invisible to us, depending on contexts – that are intertwined with other discourses. The main aim of using a critical intercultural communication framework is not to uncover what culture really is but to uncover what representations of culture come to appear real, and through which processes. Studies therefore primarily focus on the way we navigate these webs and make sense of them, the way they are constructed, interrelated and empowered. The main asset of this framework is its emphasis on problematizing culture, which reduces risks of taking it for granted. As such, critical intercultural communication also encourages researchers to be reflexive about their academic and cultural background. This can help one be aware of the extent to which one’s knowledge is situated, and therefore contributes to decreasing cultural bias in academic discourse. Generally, being aware of the representations we have of ourselves and others, as well as the reasons why these representations are constructed and conveyed, is central to developing understanding and tolerance towards others. This is especially relevant now that more and more people cross borders and that communication between cultures is faster, easier, and therefore increasingly common.

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Erickson, Keith V., Cathy A. Fleuriet, and Lawrence A. Hosman. “Prolific Publishing: Professional and Administrative Concerns.” Southern Journal of Communication 58(4) (1993): 328 – 338.

Gamson, William A., and Andre Modigliani. “Media Discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Constructionist Approach.” American Journal of Sociology 95(1) (1989): 1 – 37.

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Rivenburgh, Nancy K. “Media Framing of Complex Issues: The Case of Endangered Languages.” Public Understanding of Science 22(6) (2013): 704 – 717.

Rorty, Richard. “Solidarity or Objectivity.” In Knowledge and Inquiry. Readings in Epistemology , edited by K. Brad Wray, 422 – 437. Peterborough, ON, Canada: Broadview Press, 2002.

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Shohat, Ella, and Robert Stam. Unthinking Eurocentrism. Multiculturalism and the Media . New York: Routledge, 1994.

Soares, Maria Andrea Dos Santos. “Look, Blackness in Brazil!: Disrupting the Grotesquerie of Racial Representation in Brazilian Visual Culture.” Cultural Dynamics 24(1) (2012): 75 – 101.

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Syed, Jawad. “The Representation of Cultural Diversity in Urdu-Language Newspapers in Pakistan: A Study of Jang and Nawaiwaqt.” South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies 31(2) (2008): 317 – 347.

Verdoolaege, Annelies. “Media Representations of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and their Commitment to Reconciliation.” Journal of African Cultural Studies 17(2) (2005): 181 – 199.

Woodward, Kathryn ed., Identity and Difference . London: Sage Publications, 1997.

Note de fin

1 Debra L. Merskin, Media, Minorities, and Meaning: A Critical Introduction (New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 2011).

2 Robert M. Entman, “Framing Bias: Media in the Distribution of Power,” Journal of Communication 57, (2007).

3 Sari Pietikäinen and Helen Kelly-Holmes, “The Dangers of Normativity – The Case of Minority Language Media,” in Dangerous Multilingualism: Northern Perspectives on Order, Purity And Normality , ed. Jan Blommaert et al . (Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 194–204.

4 Isabelle Rigoni, “Intersectionality and Mediated Cultural Production in A Globalized Post-Colonial World,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 35 (2012).

5 Robert Brightman, “Forget Culture: Replacement, Transcendence, Relexification,” Cultural Anthropology 10, (1995).

6 William H. Sewell Jr, “The Concept(s) of Culture,” in Practicing History: New Directions in Historical Writing after the Linguistic Turn , ed. Gabrielle M. Spiegel (New York: Routledge, 2005), 76–95.

7 Ingrid Piller, Intercultural Communication: A Critical Introduction (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2011), 15.

9 Fred Dervin, “Approches dialogiques et énonciatives de l’interculturel : Pour une didactique des langues et de l’identité mouvante des sujets,” Synergies Roumanie 4 (2009): 166–167.

10 Fred Dervin, “A Plea for Change in Research on Intercultural Discourses: A “Liquid” Approach to the Study of the Acculturation of Chinese Students,” Journal of Multicultural Discourses 6 (March 2011): 38.

11 Sylvie Poirier, “La (dé)politisation de la culture? Réflexions sur un concept pluriel, ” Anthropologie et sociétés 28 (2004): 10 – 13.

12 Ryuko Kubota, “Critical Approaches to Intercultural Discourse and Communication,” in The Handbook of Intercultural Discourse and Communication , ed. Christina Bratt Paulston et al . (Malden, USA: John Wiley & Sons, 2012), 95.

13 Stuart Hall, “Introduction,” in Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices , ed. Stuart Hall (London: Sage Publications, 1997), 3.

15 William A. Gamson and Andre Modigliani, “Media discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Constructionist Approach,” American Journal of Sociology 95 (1989): 5.

16 Nancy K. Rivenburgh, “Media Framing of Complex Issues: The Case of Endangered Languages,” Public Understanding of Science 22 (2011): 706.

17 Ulrika Olausson, “Global warming – Global Responsibility? Media Frames of Collective Action and Scientific Certainty,” Public Understanding of Science 18 (2009): 423.

18 Marianne Jørgensen and Louise J. Phillips, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method (London: Sage Publications, 2002), 175–177.

20 Keith V. Erickson, Cathy A. Fleuriet and Lawrence A. Hosman, “Prolific Publishing: Professional and Administrative Concerns,” The Southern Communication Journal 58 (Summer 1993): 328–329.

21 Michael W. Kramer, Jon A. Hess and Loren D. Reid, “Trends in Communication Scholarship: An Analysis of Four Representative NCA and ICA Journals over the Last 70 Years,” The Review of Communication 7 (July 2007): 229–230.

23 Maggie MacLure, Discourses in Educational and Social Research ( Buckingham: Open University Press, 2003), 175.

24 Ronald D. Gordon, “Beyond the Failures of Western Communication Theory,” Journal of Multicultural Discourse 2 (2007).

25 Molefi Kete Asante, “The Ideological Significance of Afrocentricity in Intercultural Communication,” Journal of Black Studies 14 (1983).

26 Yoshitaka Miike, “Non-Western Theory in Western research? An Asiacentric Agenda for Asian Communication Studies,” The Review of Communication 6, (2006).

27 Yoshitaka Miike, “An Asiacentric Reflection on Eurocentric Bias in Communication Theory,” Communication Monographs 74 (2007).

29 Shi-Xu, “Reconstructing Eastern Paradigms of Discourse Studies ,” Journal of Multicultural Discourses 4 (2009): 33.

30 Hui-Ching Chang, Rich Holt and Lina Luo, “Representing East Asians in Intercultural Communication Textbooks: A Select Review,” The Review of Communication 6 (2006): 325–326.

31 Molefi Kete Asante, Afrocentricity: The Theory of Social Change (Chicago: African American Images, 2003), 61.

32 Ella Shohat and Robert Stam, Unthinking Eurocentrism: Multiculturalism and the Media (London: Routledge, 1994); James Curran and Myung-Jin Park, De-westernizing Media Studies (London: Routledge, 2000).

33 Eric Kit-Wai Ma, “Rethinking Media Studies: The Case of China,” in De-westernizing Media Studies , ed. James Curran et al . (London: Routledge, 1994), 32.

34 See for example Gordon, “Beyond the Failures of Western Communication Theory,” and Miike, “An Asiacentric Reflection on Eurocentric Bias in Communication Theory”.

35 Annelies Verdoolaege, “Media representations of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and their Commitment to Reconciliation,” Journal of African Cultural Studies 17 (2005).

36 Jawad Syed, “The Representation of Cultural Diversity in Urdu-Language Newspapers in Pakistan: A Study Of Jang And Nawaiwaqt,” Journal of South Asian Studies 31 (2008).

37 Yasmin Jiwani, “War Talk Engendering Terror: Race, Gender and Representation in Canadian Print Media,” International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics 1 (2005).

38 Fabienne Darling-Wolf, “Sites of Attractiveness: Japanese Women and Westernized Representations of Feminine Beauty,” Critical Studies in Media Communication 21 (2004).

39 Maria Andrea Dos Santos Soares, “Look, Blackness in Brazil!: Disrupting the Grotesquerie of Racial Representation in Brazilian Visual Culture,” Cultural Dynamics 24 (2012).

40 Anna Bredström, “Gendered Racism and the Production Of Cultural Difference: Media Representations and Identity Work among ‘Immigrant Youth’ In Contemporary Sweden,” Nora: Nordic Journal of Women’s Studies 11 (2003).

41 Shanara Rose Reid-Brinkley, “Ghetto Kids Gone Good: Race, Representation, and Authority in the Scripting of Inner-City Youths in the Urban Debate League,” Argumentation & Advocacy 49 (2012).

44 Rona T. Halualani, S. Lily Mendoza and Jolanta A. Drzewiecka, “‘Critical’” Junctures in Intercultural Communication Studies: A Review,” The Review of Communication 9 (January 2009): 24.

47 Malcom D. Brown, “Comparative Analysis of Mainstream Discourses, Media Narratives and Representations of Islam in Britain and France Prior to 9/11,” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 26 (2006).

48 Margarida Carvalho, “The Construction of the Image of Immigrants and Ethnic Minorities in Two Portuguese Daily Newspapers,” Portuguese Journal of Social Science 9 (2010).

Richard Rorty, “Solidarity or Objectivity,” in Knowledge and Inquiry. Readings in Epistemology , ed. K. Brad Wray (Peterborough, ON: Broadview Press, 2002), 432.

Pour citer cet article

Référence électronique.

Mélodine Sommier , «  The Concept of Culture in Media Studies: A Critical Review of Academic Literature  » ,  InMedia [En ligne], 5 | 2014, mis en ligne le 17 octobre 2014 , consulté le 19 mai 2024 . URL  : http://journals.openedition.org/inmedia/768 ; DOI  : https://doi.org/10.4000/inmedia.768

Mélodine Sommier

Mélodine Sommier is a doctoral student in intercultural communication at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland. She has particular interests in migration and acculturation issues as well as discourses of culture in the media.

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Media Studies is an interdisciplinary group major that weds a variety of traditions including communication, anthropology, sociology, political science, and journalism with contemporary critical and cultural studies to examine media technologies, forms, institutions, economics, policies, culture, and audiences. Students learn media history , practice, and theory in the United States and abroad. Media Studies students specialize in one of three areas of concentration: Digital Studies, Global Cultural Studies, or Media Law and Policy .

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Understanding How Digital Media Affects Child Development

Technology and digital media have become ubiquitous parts of our daily lives. Screen time among children and adolescents was high before COVID-19 emerged, and it has further risen during the pandemic, thanks in part to the lack of in-person interactions.  

In this increasingly digital world, we must strive to better understand how technology and media affect development, health outcomes, and interpersonal relationships. In fact, the fiscal year 2023 federal budget sets aside no less than $15 million within NICHD’s appropriation to investigate the effects of technology use and media consumption on infant, child, and adolescent development.

Parents may not closely oversee their children’s media use, especially as children gain independence. However, many scientific studies of child and adolescent media use have relied on parents’ recollections of how much time the children spent in front of a screen. By using software embedded within mobile devices to calculate children’s actual use, NICHD-supported researchers found that parent reports were inaccurate more often than they were on target. A little more than one-third of parents in the study underestimated their children’s usage, and nearly the same proportion overestimated it. With a recent grant award from NICHD, researchers at Baylor College of Medicine plan to overcome the limitation of relying on parental reports by using a novel technology to objectively monitor preschool-age children’s digital media use. They ultimately aim to identify the short- and long-term influences of technology and digital media use on children’s executive functioning, sleep patterns, and weight. This is one of three multi-project program grants awarded in response to NICHD’s recent funding opportunity announcement inviting proposals to examine how digital media exposure and use impact developmental trajectories and health outcomes in early childhood or adolescence. Another grant supports research to characterize the context, content, and use of digital media among children ages 1 to 8 years and to examine associations with the development of emotional regulation and social competence. A third research program seeks to better characterize the complex relationships between social media content, behaviors, brain activity, health, and well-being during adolescence.

I look forward to the findings from these ongoing projects and other studies that promise to inform guidance for technology and media use among children and adolescents. Additionally, the set-aside funding for the current fiscal year will allow us to further expand research in this area. These efforts will help us advance toward our aspirational goal to discover how technology exposure and media use affect developmental trajectories, health outcomes, and parent-child interactions.

This paper is in the following e-collection/theme issue:

Published on 17.5.2024 in Vol 26 (2024)

Reporting of Ethical Considerations in Qualitative Research Utilizing Social Media Data on Public Health Care: Scoping Review

Authors of this article:

Yujie Zhang   1, 2 * , MD ;   Jiaqi Fu   1, 2 * , MD ;   Jie Lai   1, 2 * , MD ;   Shisi Deng   1, 2 , MD ;   Zihan Guo   1, 2 , MD ;   Chuhan Zhong   1, 2 , MD ;   Jianyao Tang   1, 2 , MD ;   Wenqiong Cao   2 , BSc ;   Yanni Wu   2 , PhD

1 School of Nursing, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China

2 Nanfang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China

*these authors contributed equally

Corresponding Author:

• Yanni Wu , PhD
• Nanfang Hospital
• Southern Medical University
• No 1838 Guangzhou Avenue North
• Baiyun District, Guangdong Province
• Guangzhou , 510515
• Phone: 86 02061641192
• Email: [email protected]

• Introduction
• Conclusions
• Article Information

Models were stratified by age, cohort (sex), and calendar time, and adjusted for Southern European/Mediterranean ancestry (yes/no), married (yes/no), living alone (yes/no), smoking status (never, former, current smoker 1-14 cigarettes/d, 15-24 cigarettes/d, or ≥25 cigarettes/d), physical activity (<3.0, 3.0-8.9, 9.0-17.9, 18.0-26.9, ≥27.0 metabolic equivalent of task–h/wk), multivitamin use (yes/no), history of hypertension (yes/no), history of hypercholesterolemia (yes/no), history of diabetes (yes/no), in women postmenopausal status and menopausal hormone use (premenopausal, postmenopausal [no, past, or current hormone use]), total energy intake (kcal/d), family history of dementia (yes/no), history of depression (yes/no), census socioeconomic status (9-variable score, in quintiles), and body mass index calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared (<23, 23-25, 25-30, 30-35, ≥35). Pooled results were obtained by pooling the datasets of the cohorts. AMED score is without monounsaturated:saturated fats intake ratio component. AHEI score is without polyunsaturated fats intake component. HR indicates hazard ratio.

a Reference value.

b P  < .05.

Substitution analysis of 5 g/d intake of olive oil for the equivalent amount of butter, other vegetable oils, mayonnaise, and margarine. All Cox proportional hazards models were stratified by age and calendar time. Models were adjusted for Southern European/Mediterranean ancestry (yes/no), married (yes/no), living alone (yes/no), smoking status (never, former, current smoker 1-14 cigarettes/d, 15-24 cigarettes/d, or ≥25 cigarettes/d), alcohol intake (0, 0.1-4.9, 5.0-9.9, 10.0-14.9, and ≥15.0 g/d), physical activity (<3.0, 3.0-8.9, 9.0-17.9, 18.0-26.9, ≥27.0 metabolic equivalent of task–h/wk), multivitamin use (yes/no), history of hypertension (yes/no), history of hypercholesterolemia (yes/no), in women postmenopausal status and menopausal hormone use (premenopausal, postmenopausal [no, past, or current hormone use]), total energy intake (kcal/d), family history of dementia (yes/no), history of depression (yes/no), census socioeconomic status (9-variable score, in quintiles), body mass index calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared (<23, 23-25, 25-30, 30-35, ≥35), red meat, fruits and vegetables, nuts, soda, whole grains intake (in quintiles), and trans-fat. Pooled results were obtained by pooling the data sets of the cohorts and Cox proportional hazards model 3 was further stratified by cohort (sex). HR indicates hazard ratio.

eTable 1. Odds Ratios for Dementia-Related Mortality by APOE4 Allelic Dosage

eTable 2. Risk of Death With Dementia (Composite Outcome) According to Categories of Total Olive Oil

eTable 3. Joint Associations of Olive Oil Intake and AMED (A), and AHEI (B) With Dementia-Related Mortality Risk

eTable 4. Risk of Dementia-Related Mortality According to Categories of Total Olive Oil in the Genomic DNA Subsample

eFigure. Subgroup Analyses for 5g/d Increase in Olive Oil Intake With Dementia-Related Mortality Risk

eTable 5. Risk of Dementia-Related Mortality According to Categories of Total Olive Oil Without Stopping Diet Update Upon Report of Intermediate Non-Fatal Events

eTable 6. Risk of Dementia Mortality According to Categories of Total Olive Oil Applying a 4-Year Lag Period Between Dietary Intake and Dementia Mortality

eTable 7. Risk of Dementia-Related Mortality According to Categories of Total Olive Oil Adjusting for Other Covariates

eTable 8. Risk of Mortality From Dementia and Other Causes of Death According to Categories of Total Olive Oil Applying a Competing Risk Model

eReferences

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Tessier A , Cortese M , Yuan C, et al. Consumption of Olive Oil and Diet Quality and Risk of Dementia-Related Death. JAMA Netw Open. 2024;7(5):e2410021. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.10021

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Consumption of Olive Oil and Diet Quality and Risk of Dementia-Related Death

• 1 Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts
• 2 School of Public Health, the Second Affiliated Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China
• 3 Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts
• 4 Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
• 5 Department of Public Health and Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

Question   Is the long-term consumption of olive oil associated with dementia-related death risk?

Findings   In a prospective cohort study of 92 383 adults observed over 28 years, the consumption of more than 7 g/d of olive oil was associated with a 28% lower risk of dementia-related death compared with never or rarely consuming olive oil, irrespective of diet quality.

Meaning   These results suggest that olive oil intake represents a potential strategy to reduce dementia mortality risk.

Importance   Age-standardized dementia mortality rates are on the rise. Whether long-term consumption of olive oil and diet quality are associated with dementia-related death is unknown.

Objective   To examine the association of olive oil intake with the subsequent risk of dementia-related death and assess the joint association with diet quality and substitution for other fats.

Design, Setting, and Participants   This prospective cohort study examined data from the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS; 1990-2018) and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study (HPFS; 1990-2018). The population included women from the NHS and men from the HPFS who were free of cardiovascular disease and cancer at baseline. Data were analyzed from May 2022 to July 2023.

Exposures   Olive oil intake was assessed every 4 years using a food frequency questionnaire and categorized as (1) never or less than once per month, (2) greater than 0 to less than or equal to 4.5 g/d, (3) greater than 4.5 g/d to less than or equal to 7 g/d, and (4) greater than 7 g/d. Diet quality was based on the Alternative Healthy Eating Index and Mediterranean Diet score.

Main Outcome and Measure   Dementia death was ascertained from death records. Multivariable Cox proportional hazards regressions were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% CIs adjusted for confounders including genetic, sociodemographic, and lifestyle factors.

Results   Of 92 383 participants, 60 582 (65.6%) were women and the mean (SD) age was 56.4 (8.0) years. During 28 years of follow-up (2 183 095 person-years), 4751 dementia-related deaths occurred. Individuals who were homozygous for the apolipoprotein ε4 ( APOE ε4 ) allele were 5 to 9 times more likely to die with dementia. Consuming at least 7 g/d of olive oil was associated with a 28% lower risk of dementia-related death (adjusted pooled HR, 0.72 [95% CI, 0.64-0.81]) compared with never or rarely consuming olive oil ( P for trend < .001); results were consistent after further adjustment for APOE ε4 . No interaction by diet quality scores was found. In modeled substitution analyses, replacing 5 g/d of margarine and mayonnaise with the equivalent amount of olive oil was associated with an 8% (95% CI, 4%-12%) to 14% (95% CI, 7%-20%) lower risk of dementia mortality. Substitutions for other vegetable oils or butter were not significant.

Conclusions and Relevance   In US adults, higher olive oil intake was associated with a lower risk of dementia-related mortality, irrespective of diet quality. Beyond heart health, the findings extend the current dietary recommendations of choosing olive oil and other vegetable oils for cognitive-related health.

One-third of older adults die with Alzheimer disease or another dementia. 1 While deaths from diseases such as stroke and heart disease have been decreasing over the past 20 years, age-standardized dementia mortality rates have been on the rise. 2 The Mediterranean diet has gained in popularity owing to its recognized, multifaceted health benefits, particularly on cardiovascular outcomes. 3 Accruing evidence suggests this dietary pattern also has a beneficial effect on cognitive health. 4 As part of the Mediterranean diet, olive oil may exert anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective effects due to its high content of monounsaturated fatty acids and other compounds with antioxidant properties such as vitamin E and polyphenols. 5 A substudy conducted as part of the Prevencion con Dieta Mediterranea (PREDIMED) randomized trial provided evidence that higher intake of olive oil for 6.5 years combined with adherence to a Mediterranean diet was protective of cognitive decline when compared with a low-fat control diet. 6 - 8

Given that most previous studies on olive oil consumption and cognition were conducted in Mediterranean countries, 7 - 10 studying the US population, where olive oil consumption is generally lower, could offer unique insights. Recently, we showed that olive oil consumption was associated with a lower risk of total and cause-specific mortality in large US prospective cohort studies, including a 29% (95% CI, 22%-36%) lower risk for neurodegenerative disease mortality in participants who consumed more than 7 g/d of olive oil compared with little or none. 11 However, this previous analysis was not designed to examine the association of olive oil and diet quality with dementia-related mortality, and therefore the latter remains unclear.

In this study, we examined the association between total olive oil consumption and the subsequent risk of dementia-related mortality in 2 large prospective studies of US women and men. Additionally, we evaluated the joint associations of diet quality (adherence to the Mediterranean diet and Alternative Healthy Eating Index [AHEI] score) and olive oil consumption with the risk of dementia-related mortality. We also estimated the difference in the risk of dementia-related mortality when other dietary fats were substituted with an equivalent amount of olive oil.

Analyses were performed in 2 large US prospective cohorts: the Nurses’ Health Study I (NHS) and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study (HPFS). The NHS was initiated in 1976 and recruited 121 700 US female registered nurses aged 30 to 55 years. 12 The HPFS was established in 1986 and included 51 525 male health professionals aged 40 to 75 years. 13 The cohorts have been described elsewhere. 12 , 13 Lifestyle factors and medical history were assessed biennially through mailed questionnaires, with a follow-up rate greater than 90%. Baseline for this analysis was 1990, which is when the food frequency questionnaires (FFQs) first included information on olive oil consumption.

Participants with a history of cardiovascular disease (CVD) or cancer at baseline, with missing data on olive oil consumption, or who reported implausible total energy intakes (<500 or >3500 kcal/d for women and <800 or >4200 kcal/d for men) were excluded. The completion of the questionnaire self-selected cognitively highly functioning women and men. In total, 60 582 women and 31 801 men were included. The study protocol was approved by the institutional review boards of the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, which deemed the participants’ completion of the questionnaire to be considered as implied consent. This report followed the Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology ( STROBE ) reporting guideline.

Dietary intake was measured using a validated greater than 130-item FFQ administered in 1990 and every 4 years thereafter. The validity and reliability of the FFQ have been described previously. 14 Participants were asked how frequently they consumed specific foods, including types of fats and oils used for cooking or added to meals in the past 12 months. Total olive oil intake was determined by summing up answers to 3 questions related to olive oil consumption (ie, olive oil used for salad dressings, olive oil added to food or bread, and olive oil used for baking and frying at home). The equivalent of 1 tablespoon of olive oil was considered to be 13.5 g. Intakes of other fats and nutrients were calculated using the United States Department of Agriculture and Harvard University Food Composition Database, 15 and biochemical analyses. The nutritional composition of olive oil and other types of fat, as well as trends of types of fat intake in the NHS and HPFS, have been reported previously. 11

Adherence to the Mediterranean diet was assessed using a modified version of the 9-point Alternative Mediterranean index (AMED) score. 16 Adherence to the AHEI (0-110), previously associated with lower risk of chronic disease, was also computed. 17 Higher scores indicated better overall diet quality.

The apolipoprotein E ε4 ( APOE ε4 ) allele is known to interfere with lipid and glucose metabolism such that it increases the risk of dementia. 18  APOE genotyping was conducted in a subset of 27 296 participants. Blood samples were collected between 1989 and 1990 in the NHS and between 1993 and 1995 in the HPFS. NHS participants who had not provided blood samples were invited to contribute buccal samples from 2002 to 2004. DNA was extracted with the ReturPureGene DNA Isolation Kit (Gentra Systems). The APOE genotype was determined using a Taqman Assay (Applied Biosystems) 19 in 5069 participants, and through imputation from multiple genome-wide association studies, 20 which has shown high accuracy, 20 in the remaining subset.

Deaths were ascertained from state vital statistics records and the National Death Index or by reports from next of kin or the postal authorities. The follow-up for mortality exceeded 98% in these cohorts. Dementia deaths were determined by physician review of medical records, autopsy reports, or death certificates. Dementia deaths were those in which dementia was listed as the underlying cause of death, or as a contributing cause of death, or as reported by the family, in the absence of a more likely cause. The International Classification of Diseases, Eighth Revision (ICD-8) was used in the NHS and ICD-9 in the HPFS, which were the revisions used at the inception of those cohorts. Dementia deaths included codes 290.0 (senile dementia, simple type), 290.1 (presenile dementia), and 331.0 (Alzheimer disease). To test the validity of the dementia mortality outcome, we examined the likelihood of dementia mortality by APOE ε4 allelic dosage (eTable 1 in Supplement 1 ). 18 A composite outcome was also created including both participants who reported having dementia during follow-up and later died, with those who had dementia reported on their death certificate.

Participants completed biennial questionnaires reporting updates on body weight, smoking, physical activity, multivitamin use, menopausal status, and postmenopausal hormone use in women, family history of dementia, self-report of chronic diseases, and ancestry. History of depression was identified based on antidepressive medication use and self-report of depression. Socioeconomic status (SES) was established through a composite score derived from home address details and various factors such as income, education, and housing; the composite score methods are described in a previous report. 21 Body mass index (BMI) was obtained by dividing the weight in kilograms by the height in meters squared.

In each cohort, age-stratified Cox proportional hazard models were used to evaluate the association of olive oil intake with dementia-related mortality. Participant person-time was calculated from baseline until end of follow-up (June 30, 2018, in NHS; January 31, 2018, in HPFS), loss to follow-up, or death, whichever came first. The cumulative average (mean) of olive oil intake from all available FFQs, from baseline until 2014 (or loss to follow-up or death), was used as the exposure. Because potential diet modifications following cancer or CVD diagnosis may not represent long-term diet, we ceased updating dietary variables upon report of these conditions. For missing covariates, we carried forward nonmissing values from previous questionnaires and assigned median values for continuous variables.

Participants were categorized by olive oil intake frequency: never or less than once per month (reference group), greater than 0 to less than or equal to 4.5 g/d, greater than 4.5 g/d to less than or equal to 7 g/d, and greater than 7 g/d. P values for linear trends were obtained using the Wald test on a continuous variable represented by the median intake of each category. Multivariable Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate the hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% CIs for dementia mortality according to categories of olive oil intake, separately in each cohort. Participants were censored at death from causes other than dementia. Model 1 was stratified for age and calendar time. Multivariable model 2 was adjusted for Southern European/Mediterranean ancestry, married, living alone, smoking, alcohol intake, physical activity, multivitamin use, history of hypertension and hypercholesterolemia, in women postmenopausal status and menopausal hormone use, total energy intake, family history of dementia, history of depression, census SES, and BMI. Multivariable model 3 was further adjusted for intake of red meat, fruits and vegetables, nuts, soda, whole grains, and trans-fat, all indicative of diet quality.

In a secondary analysis we used the composite outcome for dementia-related deaths. We also repeated the main analysis in the genotyping subsample. We carried out mediation analyses to calculate the percentage of the association between olive oil intake and dementia-related mortality that is attributable to CVD, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, and diabetes. We also performed stratified analyses by prespecified subgroups (eMethods in Supplement 1 ).

A joint analysis was performed to test whether olive oil intake (never or <1/mo, >0 to ≤7g/d, and >7g/d) and the AMED or the AHEI score (tertiles) combined as the exposure was associated with dementia mortality. In substitution analyses, we assessed the risk of dementia-related mortality by replacing 5 g/d of different fat sources, including margarine, mayonnaise, butter, and a combination of other vegetable oils (corn, safflower, soybean, and canola), with olive oil. Both continuous variables as 5-g/d increments were included in a multivariable model 3, mutually adjusted for other types of fat. The difference in the coefficients obtained for olive oil and the substituted fat provided the estimated HR and 95% CI for substituting 5 g/d of olive oil for an equivalent amount of the other fats.

Several exploratory sensitivity analyses were performed including a 4-year lagged analysis, analyses adjusting for other covariates, a cause-specific competing risk model and analyses excluding participants who self-reported having dementia at baseline (n = 12) (eMethods in Supplement 1 ). Analyses were performed from May 2022 to July 2023 using SAS version 9.4 (SAS Institute). All statistical tests were 2-sided with an α = .05.

Over 2 183 095 person-years of follow-up, this study documented a total of 4751 dementia deaths (3473 in NHS and 1278 in HPFS; 37 649 total deaths). Among 92 383 participants included at baseline in 1990, 60 582 (65.6%) were women, and the mean (SD) age was 56.4 (8.0) years. Mean (SD) olive oil intake was 1.3 (2.5) g/d in both NHS and HPFS; the mean (SD) adherence score for the Mediterranean diet was 4.5 (1.9) points in the NHS and 4.2 (1.9) points in the HPFS; and the mean (SD) AHEI diet quality score was 52.5 (11.1) points in the NHS and 53.4 (11.6) points in the HPFS.

Table 1 shows baseline characteristics of participants categorized by total olive oil intake. Participants with a higher olive oil intake (>7 g/d) at baseline had an overall higher caloric intake, but not a higher BMI, had better diet quality, had higher alcohol intake, were more physically active, and were less likely to smoke compared with those never consuming olive oil or less than once per month ( Table1 ). Individuals who were homozygous for the APOE ε4 allele were 5.5 to 9.4 times more likely to die with dementia compared with noncarriers for the APOE e4 allele (χ 2  P  < .001) (eTable 1 in Supplement 1 ).

Olive oil intake was inversely associated with dementia-related mortality in age-stratified and multivariable-adjusted models ( Table 2 ). Compared with participants with the lowest olive oil intake, the pooled HR for dementia-related death among participants with the highest olive oil intake (>7 g/d) was 0.72 (95% CI, 0.64-0.81), after adjusting for sociodemographic and lifestyle factors. The association between each 5-g increment in olive oil consumption with dementia-related death was also inverse and significant in the pooled analysis. The multivariable-adjusted HR for dementia-related death for the highest compared with the lowest olive oil intake (>7 g/d) was 0.67 (95% CI, 0.59-0.77) for women and 0.87 (95% CI, 0.69-1.09) for men ( Table 2 ). Olive oil intake in 5-g increments was inversely associated with dementia-related mortality in women (HR, 0.88 [95% CI, 0.84-0.93]), but not in men (HR, 0.96 [95% CI, 0.88-1.04]). Analyses remained consistent when using the composite outcome for death with dementia (eTable 2 in Supplement 2 ). In the genotyping subsample, the results remained unchanged after further adjusting for the APOE ε4 allelic genotype (multivariable-adjusted pooled HR comparing high vs low olive oil intake, 0.66 [95% CI, 0.54-0.81]; P for trend < .001) (eTable 4 in Supplement 1 ). Pooled mediation analyses found that CVD, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, and diabetes did not significantly attenuate the association (unchanged HRs with and without adjusting for the intermediate; data not shown).

In joint analyses, participants with the highest olive oil intake had a lower risk for dementia-related mortality, irrespective of their AMED score (28% to 34% lower risk compared with participants in the combined low olive oil and high AMED) ( Figure 1 A; eTable 3 in Supplement 1 ) and of their AHEI (27% to 38% lower risk compared with participants with low olive oil and high AHEI) ( Figure 1 B; eTable 3 in Supplement 1 ).

Replacing 5 g/d of mayonnaise with 5 g/d of olive oil was associated with a 14% (95% CI, 7%-20%) lower risk of dementia-related mortality in pooled multivariable-adjusted models ( Figure 2 ). As for the substitution of 5 g/d of margarine with the equivalent amount of olive oil, we estimated an 8% (95% CI, 4%-12%) lower risk. Substitutions of other vegetable oils or butter with olive oil were not statistically significant.

Exploratory subgroup analyses (eFigure in Supplement 1 ) showed associations between higher olive oil intake and lower risk of dementia-related mortality across most subgroups. No statistically significant associations were found in participants with a family history of dementia, living alone, using a multivitamin, and in non– APOE ε4 carriers. Results from exploratory sensitivity analyses (eTables 5-8 in Supplement 1 ) were comparable with the findings from the main analysis (eResults in Supplement 1 ).

In 2 large US prospective cohorts of men and women, we found that participants who consumed more than 7 g/d of olive oil had 28% lower risk of dying from dementia compared with participants who never or rarely consumed olive oil. This association remained significant after adjustment for diet quality scores including adherence to the Mediterranean diet. We estimated that substituting 5 g/d of margarine and mayonnaise with olive oil was associated with significantly lower dementia-related death risk, but not when substituting butter and other vegetable oils. These findings provide evidence to support dietary recommendations advocating for the use of olive oil and other vegetable oils as a potential strategy to maintain overall health and prevent dementia.

In the NHS and HPFS, a lower risk of neurodegenerative disease mortality, including dementia mortality, was observed with higher olive oil consumption (HR, 0.81 [95% CI, 0.78-0.84]). 11 Evidence that pertains to cognitive decline or incident dementia is more widely available than it is for dementia mortality. 6 , 22 In the French Three-City Study (n = 6947), participants with the highest olive oil intake were 17% (95% CI, 1%-29%) less likely to experience a 4-year cognitive decline related to visual memory, but no association was found for verbal fluency (odds ratio [OR], 0.85 [95% CI, 0.70-1.03]). 22 Furthermore, participants with a higher intake of olive oil (moderate or intensive vs never) had a lower risk of verbal fluency and visual memory cognitive impairment. Potential sex differences were not investigated. In the PREDIMED trial, which supplemented a Mediterranean-style diet with extra-virgin olive oil (1 L/wk/household) or nuts (30 g/d), 23 the authors investigated cognitive effects and status in 285 and 522 cognitively healthy participants using global and in-depth neuropsychological battery testing. Although the study was not originally designed for cognitive outcomes and the effect of olive oil cannot be isolated, after 6.5 years, the olive oil group exhibited improved cognitive performance in verbal fluency and memory tests compared with a low-fat diet (control), and they were less prone to develop mild cognitive impairment (OR, 0.34 [95% CI, 0.12-0.97]; n = 285). 6 Global cognitive performance was higher in both the olive oil and the nut groups compared with the control post trial (n = 522). 8 These studies were conducted in Europe, in populations with typically higher olive oil intake compared with US populations.

Observational studies and some trials have consistently found associations between following diets such as the Mediterranean, DASH, MIND, and AHEI, and prudent patterns to healthier brain structure, 24 reduced cognitive impairment and Alzheimer risk, and improved cognitive function. 4 In our study, those with the highest olive oil intake (>7 g/d) had the lowest dementia-related death risk compared with those with minimal intake (never or less than once per month), regardless of diet quality. This highlights a potentially specific role for olive oil. Still, the group with both high AHEI scores and high olive oil intake exhibited the lowest dementia mortality risk (HR, 0.68 [95% CI, 0.58-0.79]; reference: low AHEI score and low olive oil intake), suggesting that combining higher diet quality with higher olive oil intake may confer enhanced benefit.

Olive oil consumption may lower dementia mortality by improving vascular health. 18 Several clinical trials support the effect of olive oil in reducing CVD via improved endothelial function, coagulation, lipid metabolism, oxidative stress, platelet aggregation and decreased inflammation. 25 Nonetheless, the results of our study remained independent of hypertension and hypercholesterolemia. Mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer disease, and related dementias were associated with abnormal blood brain barrier permeability, possibly allowing the crossing of neurotoxic molecules into the brain. 26 Mechanistical evidence from animal 27 - 29 and human studies 9 , 30 have shown that phenolic compounds in olive oil, particularly extra-virgin olive oil, may attenuate inflammation, oxidative stress and restore blood brain barrier function, thereby reducing brain amyloid-β and tau-related pathologies and improving cognitive function. However, incident CVD, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, and diabetes were not significant mediators of the association between olive oil intake and dementia-related death in our study.

The association was significant in both sexes but did not remain in men after full adjustment of the model. Some previous research has reported cognitive-related sex differences. Evidence from trials also showed sex- and/or gender-specific responses to lifestyle interventions for preventing cognitive decline, possibly due to differences in brain structure, hormones (sex) and social factors (gender). 31 Olive oil intake may be protective of dementia and related mortality, particularly in women. Nonetheless, we did not observe significant heterogeneity or interaction of cohort by olive oil intake on the risk of fatal dementia. Sex and gender differences should be carefully considered in future studies examining the association or effect of olive oil on cognitive-related outcomes to improve our understanding.

We found that using olive oil instead of margarine and mayonnaise, but not butter and other vegetable oils, was associated with a lower risk of dementia-related death. At the time of the study, margarine and mayonnaise contained considerable levels of hydrogenated trans-fats. The latter were strongly associated with all-cause mortality, CVD, type 2 diabetes, and dementia, 32 , 33 which may explain the lower dementia-related death risk observed when replacing it with olive oil. The US Food and Drug Administration banned manufacturers from adding partially hydrogenated oils to foods in 2020. 34 Future studies examining intake of trans-fat–free margarine will be informative. Although the substitution of butter with olive oil was found to be associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes, CVD, and total mortality, 11 we did not find an association with the risk of dementia mortality. Although these previous studies did not examine the associations for butter per se, intake of regular fat dairy products, including cheese, yogurt, and milk, was reported to be either not associated or inversely associated with lower cognitive function, cognitive decline, and dementia. 35 - 37

Our cohort analyses include several strengths, namely the long follow-up period and large sample size with a high number of dementia death cases. Also, we included genotyping of the APOE ε4 allele in a large subsample of participants to reduce potential confounding attributed to this well-known risk factor for Alzheimer disease. Additionally, our repeated diet measurements, weight, and lifestyle variables permitted us to account for long-term olive oil intake and confounding factors. Furthermore, the use of dietary cumulative average updates reduced random measurement error by considering within-person variations in intake.

This study has limitations. The possibility of reverse causation cannot be excluded due to the observational nature of our study. However, the 4-year lagged analysis results, consistent with the primary analysis, suggest that olive oil intake is predictive of dementia mortality rather than a consequence of premorbid dementia. While it is plausible that higher olive oil intake could be indicative of a healthier diet and higher SES, our results remained consistent after accounting for the latter. Despite adjusting for key covariates, residual confounding may remain due to unmeasured factors. Also, our study was conducted among health professionals. While this minimizes the potential confounding effects of socioeconomic factors and likely increases reporting due to a high level of education, this may also limit generalizability. Our population was predominantly of non-Hispanic White participants, limiting generalizability to more diverse populations. Additionally, we could not differentiate among various types of olive oil that differ in their polyphenols and other nonlipid bioactive compounds content.

This study found that in US adults, particularly women, consuming more olive oil was associated with lower risk of dementia-related mortality, regardless of diet quality. Substituting olive oil intake for margarine and mayonnaise was associated with lower risk of dementia mortality and may be a potential strategy to improve longevity free of dementia. These findings extend the current dietary recommendations of choosing olive oil and other vegetable oils to the context of cognitive health and related mortality.

Accepted for Publication: March 6, 2024.

Published: May 6, 2024. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.10021

Open Access: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CC-BY License . © 2024 Tessier AJ et al. JAMA Network Open .

Corresponding Authors: Anne-Julie Tessier, RD, PhD ( [email protected] ), and Marta Guasch-Ferré, PhD ( [email protected] ), Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, 655 Huntington Ave, Bldg 2, Boston, MA 02115.

Author Contributions: Drs Tessier and Guasch-Ferré had full access to all of the data in the study and take responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.

Concept and design: Tessier, Chavarro, Hu, Willett, Guasch-Ferré.

Acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data: Tessier, Cortese, Yuan, Bjornevik, Ascherio, Wang, Chavarro, Stampfer, Willett, Guasch-Ferré.

Drafting of the manuscript: Tessier.

Critical review of the manuscript for important intellectual content: Tessier, Cortese, Yuan, Bjornevik, Ascherio, Wang, Chavarro, Stampfer, Hu, Willett, Guasch-Ferré.

Statistical analysis: Tessier, Cortese, Wang, Willett, Guasch-Ferré.

Obtained funding: Chavarro, Stampfer, Hu, Guasch-Ferré.

Administrative, technical, or material support: Cortese, Yuan, Stampfer, Hu.

Supervision: Chavarro, Hu, Guasch-Ferré.

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: Dr Cortese reported a speaker honorarium from Roche outside the submitted work. Dr Ascherio reported receiving speaker honoraria from WebMD, Prada Foundation, Biogen, Moderna, Merck, Roche, and Glaxo-Smith-Kline. No other disclosures were reported.

Funding/Support: This study is supported by the research grant R21 AG070375 from the National Institutes of Health to Dr Guasch-Ferré. The NHS, NHSII and HPFS are supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (UM1 CA186107, P01 CA87969, U01 CA167552, P30 DK046200, HL034594, HL088521, HL35464, HL60712). Dr Tessier is supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Postdoctoral Fellowship Award. Dr Guasch-Ferré is supported the Novo Nordisk Foundation grant NNF23SA0084103.

Role of the Funder/Sponsor: The funders had no role in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; and decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

Data Sharing Statement: See Supplement 2 .

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Microsoft Research Blog

Microsoft at chi 2024: innovations in human-centered design.

Published May 15, 2024

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The ways people engage with technology, through its design and functionality, determine its utility and acceptance in everyday use, setting the stage for widespread adoption. When computing tools and services respect the diversity of people’s experiences and abilities, technology is not only functional but also universally accessible. Human-computer interaction (HCI) plays a crucial role in this process, examining how technology integrates into our daily lives and exploring ways digital tools can be shaped to meet individual needs and enhance our interactions with the world.

The ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems is a premier forum that brings together researchers and experts in the field, and Microsoft is honored to support CHI 2024 as a returning sponsor. We’re pleased to announce that 33 papers by Microsoft researchers and their collaborators have been accepted this year, with four winning the Best Paper Award and seven receiving honorable mentions.

This research aims to redefine how people work, collaborate, and play using technology, with a focus on design innovation to create more personalized, engaging, and effective interactions. Several projects emphasize customizing the user experience to better meet individual needs, such as exploring the potential of large language models (LLMs) to help reduce procrastination. Others investigate ways to boost realism in virtual and mixed reality environments, using touch to create a more immersive experience. There are also studies that address the challenges of understanding how people interact with technology. These include applying psychology and cognitive science to examine the use of generative AI and social media, with the goal of using the insights to guide future research and design directions. This post highlights these projects.

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Collaborators: Renewable energy storage with Bichlien Nguyen and David Kwabi

Dr. Bichlien Nguyen and Dr. David Kwabi explore their work in flow batteries and how machine learning can help more effectively search the vast organic chemistry space to identify compounds with properties just right for storing waterpower and other renewables.

Best Paper Award recipients

DynaVis: Dynamically Synthesized UI Widgets for Visualization Editing   Priyan Vaithilingam, Elena L. Glassman, Jeevana Priya Inala , Chenglong Wang   GUIs used for editing visualizations can overwhelm users or limit their interactions. To address this, the authors introduce DynaVis, which combines natural language interfaces with dynamically synthesized UI widgets, enabling people to initiate and refine edits using natural language.  

Generative Echo Chamber? Effects of LLM-Powered Search Systems on Diverse Information Seeking   Nikhil Sharma, Q. Vera Liao , Ziang Xiao   Conversational search systems powered by LLMs potentially improve on traditional search methods, yet their influence on increasing selective exposure and fostering echo chambers remains underexplored. This research suggests that LLM-driven conversational search may enhance biased information querying, particularly when the LLM’s outputs reinforce user views, emphasizing significant implications for the development and regulation of these technologies.  

Piet: Facilitating Color Authoring for Motion Graphics Video   Xinyu Shi, Yinghou Wang, Yun Wang , Jian Zhao   Motion graphic (MG) videos use animated visuals and color to effectively communicate complex ideas, yet existing color authoring tools are lacking. This work introduces Piet, a tool prototype that offers an interactive palette and support for quick theme changes and controlled focus, significantly streamlining the color design process.

The Metacognitive Demands and Opportunities of Generative AI   Lev Tankelevitch , Viktor Kewenig, Auste Simkute, Ava Elizabeth Scott, Advait Sarkar , Abigail Sellen , Sean Rintel   Generative AI systems offer unprecedented opportunities for transforming professional and personal work, yet they present challenges around prompting, evaluating and relying on outputs, and optimizing workflows. This paper shows that metacognition—the psychological ability to monitor and control one’s thoughts and behavior—offers a valuable lens through which to understand and design for these usability challenges.  

Honorable Mentions

B ig or Small, It’s All in Your Head: Visuo-Haptic Illusion of Size-Change Using Finger-Repositioning Myung Jin Kim, Eyal Ofek, Michel Pahud , Mike J. Sinclair, Andrea Bianchi   This research introduces a fixed-sized VR controller that uses finger repositioning to create a visuo-haptic illusion of dynamic size changes in handheld virtual objects, allowing users to perceive virtual objects as significantly smaller or larger than the actual device. 

LLMR: Real-time Prompting of Interactive Worlds Using Large Language Models   Fernanda De La Torre, Cathy Mengying Fang, Han Huang, Andrzej Banburski-Fahey, Judith Amores , Jaron Lanier   Large Language Model for Mixed Reality (LLMR) is a framework for the real-time creation and modification of interactive mixed reality experiences using LLMs. It uses novel strategies to tackle difficult cases where ideal training data is scarce or where the design goal requires the synthesis of internal dynamics, intuitive analysis, or advanced interactivity. 

Observer Effect in Social Media Use   Koustuv Saha, Pranshu Gupta, Gloria Mark, Emre Kiciman , Munmun De Choudhury   This work investigates the observer effect in behavioral assessments on social media use. The observer effect is a phenomenon in which individuals alter their behavior due to awareness of being monitored. Conducted over an average of 82 months (about 7 years) retrospectively and five months prospectively using Facebook data, the study found that deviations in expected behavior and language post-enrollment in the study reflected individual psychological traits. The authors recommend ways to mitigate the observer effect in these scenarios.

Reading Between the Lines: Modeling User Behavior and Costs in AI-Assisted Programming   Hussein Mozannar, Gagan Bansal , Adam Fourney , Eric Horvitz   By investigating how developers use GitHub Copilot, the authors created CUPS, a taxonomy of programmer activities during system interaction. This approach not only elucidates interaction patterns and inefficiencies but can also drive more effective metrics and UI design for code-recommendation systems with the goal of improving programmer productivity. 

SharedNeRF: Leveraging Photorealistic and View-dependent Rendering for Real-time and Remote Collaboration   Mose Sakashita, Bala Kumaravel, Nicolai Marquardt , Andrew D. Wilson   SharedNeRF, a system for synchronous remote collaboration, utilizes neural radiance field (NeRF) technology to provide photorealistic, viewpoint-specific renderings that are seamlessly integrated with point clouds to capture dynamic movements and changes in a shared space. A preliminary study demonstrated its effectiveness, as participants used this high-fidelity, multi-perspective visualization to successfully complete a flower arrangement task. 

Understanding the Role of Large Language Models in Personalizing and Scaffolding Strategies to Combat Academic Procrastination   Ananya Bhattacharjee, Yuchen Zeng, Sarah Yi Xu, Dana Kulzhabayeva, Minyi Ma, Rachel Kornfield, Syed Ishtiaque Ahmed, Alex Mariakakis, Mary P. Czerwinski , Anastasia Kuzminykh, Michael Liut, Joseph Jay Williams   In this study, the authors explore the potential of LLMs for customizing academic procrastination interventions, employing a technology probe to generate personalized advice. Their findings emphasize the need for LLMs to offer structured, deadline-oriented advice and adaptive questioning techniques, providing key design insights for LLM-based tools while highlighting cautions against their use for therapeutic guidance.

Where Are We So Far? Understanding Data Storytelling Tools from the Perspective of Human-AI Collaboration   Haotian Li, Yun Wang , Huamin Qu This paper evaluates data storytelling tools using a dual framework to analyze the stages of the storytelling workflow—analysis, planning, implementation, communication—and the roles of humans and AI in each stage, such as creators, assistants, optimizers, and reviewers. The study identifies common collaboration patterns in existing tools, summarizes lessons from these patterns, and highlights future research opportunities for human-AI collaboration in data storytelling.

Learn more about our work and contributions to CHI 2024, including our full list of publications , on our conference webpage .

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Llmr: real-time prompting of interactive worlds using large language models, reading between the lines: modeling user behavior and costs in ai-assisted programming, observer effect in social media use, where are we so far understanding data storytelling tools from the perspective of human-ai collaboration, the metacognitive demands and opportunities of generative ai, piet: facilitating color authoring for motion graphics video, dynavis: dynamically synthesized ui widgets for visualization editing, generative echo chamber effects of llm-powered search systems on diverse information seeking, understanding the role of large language models in personalizing and scaffolding strategies to combat academic procrastination, sharednerf: leveraging photorealistic and view-dependent rendering for real-time and remote collaboration, big or small, it’s all in your head: visuo-haptic illusion of size-change using finger-repositioning, continue reading.

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Statistics > Methodology

Title: trajecctory-based individualized treatment rules.

Abstract: A core component of precision medicine research involves optimizing individualized treatment rules (ITRs) based on patient characteristics. Many studies used to estimate ITRs are longitudinal in nature, collecting outcomes over time. Yet, to date, methods developed to estimate ITRs often ignore the longitudinal structure of the data. Information available from the longitudinal nature of the data can be especially useful in mental health studies. Although treatment means might appear similar, understanding the trajectory of outcomes over time can reveal important differences between treatments and placebo effects. This longitudinal perspective is especially beneficial in mental health research, where subtle shifts in outcome patterns can hold significant implications. Despite numerous studies involving the collection of outcome data across various time points, most precision medicine methods used to develop ITRs overlook the information available from the longitudinal structure. The prevalence of missing data in such studies exacerbates the issue, as neglecting the longitudinal nature of the data can significantly impair the effectiveness of treatment rules. This paper develops a powerful longitudinal trajectory-based ITR construction method that incorporates baseline variables, via a single-index or biosignature, into the modeling of longitudinal outcomes. This trajectory-based ITR approach substantially minimizes the negative impact of missing data compared to more traditional ITR approaches. The approach is illustrated through simulation studies and a clinical trial for depression, contrasting it with more traditional ITRs that ignore longitudinal information.

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