Social media does affect your mental health in one or the other away, but the question is how much time it takes for social media to seriously harm your psyche.
Well, a study published in JAMA Psychiatry found that using social media for over half an hour a day has increased the risk of mental health issues, especially in teenagers.
The study also found that the mental health of teenagers was greatly affected by using social media for more than three hours a day, even after they logged off.
The teenagers participated in the study, who used social media for more than three hours a day, were found to have a 60 percent greater risk of developing mental health issues and the teenagers who spent more than six hours had 78 percent risk.
Lead study author Kira Riehm told Inverse, “This pattern of findings may be explained by a number of potential mechanisms, including exposure to cyberbullying, poor quality sleep, or exposure to idealized self-presentations, which have been found in other studies to be associated with depressive and anxiety symptoms.”
She explained that there are strong links between poor quality sleep and the risk of developing mental health issues such as anxiety and depression. She also noted that using social media at night is associated with poor sleep, which could affect mental health.
Several studies have been conducted to analyze the effect of social media on sleep, which found that screen time, including smartphones or televisions, could affect sleep
Using social media has been often linked to increased risk of mental health issues; however, there are still ongoing debates related to his topic.
For instance, one study conducted by the researchers at Michigan State University found that regular use of social media could improve mental health among adults. In fact, it found that social media could help reduce the risk of psychological distress such as anxiety and depression.
Riehm said that their study tried to directly look at the connection between social media use and mental health. She said, “In our study, we measured mental health problems before social media use and controlled for this in our analyses, so we can be more certain (but not completely certain) that reverse causality does not account for our findings.”
She explained that social media could greatly influence people. She advised teenagers to limit the use of social media in order to decrease their risk of developing mental health issues. Recently, Harry Hamlin’s daughter Delilah Belle’s iPhone case read, “Social media seriously harms your mental health,” who often addresses some mental health issues on Instagram.
