Is excessive use of social media an addiction?
BMJ 2019; 365 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.l2171 (Published 15 May 2019) Cite this as: BMJ 2019;365:l2171
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Dear Editor,
While we agree with Zendle et al. that further research is required to better understand the association between social media use and addiction (1), we feel several considerations need to be made before science jumps into bed with industry.
Firstly, the reliability of data from social media platforms must be questioned; as a recent study found that despite the minimum age being thirteen, 3 in 4 children aged 10-12 years old have their own social media account (2), suggesting that industry data has similar limitations to the self-reported Bergen questionnaire (1). Furthermore, the popularity of different platforms is constantly changing, with Facebook use in 12-15 year olds down from 40% to 31% between 2017-18 (3). This suggests that industry data may not be useful for longitudinal studies as the fluctuating popularity of different social media platforms makes attrition bias a limiting factor.
Finally, we believe industry data will not provide the information needed in order to distinguish addiction from excessive use, as social media platforms cannot record the emotional and behavioural affects that use and inability to use social media provoke. The question Zendle et al. pose is an important one and industry as well as science has a duty to seek an answer. However, in this era of digital relationships, it may be that we need to disconnect from the social media industry, in order to reconnect to our patients.
References
1. Zendle, D. & Bowden-Jones, H. Is excessive use of social media an addiction? BMJ 365, l2171 (2019).
2. Childrenscommissioner.gov.uk. 2019 [cited 17 May 2019]. Available from: https://www.childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Chil...
3. Ofcom.org.uk. 2019 [cited 17 May 2019]. Available from: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0024/134907/Children-and...
Competing interests: No competing interests
Life is lonely, because communication is like an asymptote. Asymptotes are geometrics with two lines that are close but don't quite connect; while communication is dialectics with two lives that are close but don't quite connect. Unrequited and disquieting, our lonely lives lack the nexus of context and impact of contact.
Competing interests: No competing interests
Technological Déjà Vu
Zendle and Bowen-Jones are correct when they point towards methodological shortcomings in research that aims to understand the impact of social media [1]. However, these observations also apply to related research, which considers the impact of technology use more generally. Designs typically involve asking people to consider their personal experience with technology [2] and this reflects a general shift away from behavioral measurement in psychology [3,4]. In a recent article, we tested the predictive ability of popular assessment inventories used to quantify smartphone usage. These inventories did not align well with even the most basic measures of objective behavior, including those associated with compulsive use (e.g., rapid checking) [1,5]. It remains unclear exactly what these assessment inventories are measuring. Interestingly, survey items are conceptually very similar to depression and anxiety scales. This alone may explain small negative associations between technology use and mood.
Alongside these limitations, narratives surrounding the mass adoption of new technologies are almost always negative. In response, researchers might want to start asking themselves exactly why or how the use of social communication technology would cause harm and develop more suitable measures accordingly. Social media is certainly not the first technology to be associated with potentially ‘addictive’ or negative societal impacts [6,7], nor will it be the last. Moral panics concerning new technology (e.g., the printing press, the telephone, microwaves, the internet, social media) are, historically speaking, either overblown or demonstrably false.
Understanding the impact of technology on people and society remains crucial, but clinicians and researchers might also want to consider what drives ‘technophobia’ in the first place.
1. Ellis DA, Davidson BI, Shaw H, Geyer K. (2019). Do smartphone usage scales predict behavior? International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Special Issue on Human Accuracy. DOI: 10.1016/j.ijhcs.2019.05.004
2. Ellis DA. Are smartphones really that bad? Improving the psychological measurement of technology-related behaviors. (2019). Computers in Human Behavior. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2019.03.006
3. Doliński D. (2018). Is Psychology Still a Science of Behaviour? Social Psychological Bulletin. 13. e25025
4. Sassenberg K, Ditrich L. (2019). Research in Social Psychology Changed Between 2011 and 2016: Larger Sample Sizes, More Self-Report Measures, and More Online Studies. Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science. DOI: 10.1177/2515245919838781
5. Andrews S, Ellis DA, Shaw H, Piwek L. (2015). Beyond self-report: Tools to compare estimated and real-world smartphone use. PLoS One. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0139004
6. Parker S. (1995). Science Discoveries: Alexander Graham Bell. Philadelphia, USA: Chelsea House Publishers
7. Edgerton D. (1995). Technophobia then and now. Nature. 376(6542):653–4
Competing interests: No competing interests