Social media use and the not-so-imaginary audience: Behavioral and neural mechanisms underlying the influence on self-concept

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience

L.P.E. van der Aar¹  R. Van der Cruijsen²  E.A. Crone²  S. Peters³  A.I. Becht³  J.P. Spaans⁴ 

[1] Corresponding author at: Department of Developmental Psychology, Leiden University. Wassenaarseweg 52, 2333AK, the Netherlands.;Leiden Institute for Brain and Cognition, The Netherlands, Albinusdreef 2, 2333 ZA, Leiden, the Netherlands;Department of Developmental Psychology, Leiden University, Wassenaarseweg 52, 2333AK, the Netherlands;Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Erasmus University Rotterdam. Burgemeester Oudlaan 50, 3062 PA, Rotterdam, the Netherlands;

关键词: Social media;    Self-concept;    Medial prefrontal cortex;    Adolescence;    Self-esteem;    Development;   

DOI  :  

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

We investigated behavioral and neural mechanisms in the relation between social media use (SMU) and self-concept, as well as longitudinal developmental outcomes. Adolescents and young adults (N = 150, 11–21 years old at T1) rated themselves on 60 traits in the academic, physical and prosocial domain, and also indicated how they thought peers would judge them (reflected-peer-judgements). Longitudinal questionnaires (1- and 2-year follow-up) were collected to assess positive (prosocial behavior, self-concept clarity) and negative (clinical symptoms) long-term outcomes.Results indicated that heavier self-reported SMU was linked with lower difference scores between self-judgements and reflected-peer-judgements. Lower SMU was related to more positive ratings from self-judgements vs. reflected-peer-judgements. SMU was also associated with less positive self-concept, particularly in the academic domain (boys and girls) and physical domain (girls). Neurally, increased SMU was linked to heightened mPFC-activity during self-judgements compared to reflected-peer-judgements, and increased activity during physical compared to academic and prosocial self-judgements. Longitudinal analyses indicated no evidence for long-term effects of social media use, self/reflected-peer-difference scores and mPFC-activity on clinical symptoms, prosocial behavior or self-concept clarity. This study highlights the complex relationship between social media use and wellbeing and future research is needed to confirm the lack of long-term effects.

【 授权许可】

Unknown