Passive use of social media is related to a greater prevalence of solitude: it is not worth the same if you are hired actively.
An important theme is often lost in the effects of social media on mental health on mental health on mental health: the … as. How do we use social media? Are they means to interact, contact, communicate actively or a passive filler of empty hours, which pass as quick as minutes? The difference counts: a study by the Joint Research Center (JRC), the scientific research service of the European Commission, on how young people in Europe relate to social media reveals a strong connection between their passive use and the feelings of disconnection and solitude.
Time online. The data were extrapolated from EU Lonelyss Survey, an investigation into solitude perceived by European citizens conducted on just under 30,000 people between November and December 2022. The new analysis wanted to deepen the relationship of the interviewees with social networks and instant messaging apps. In the group of subjects between 16 and 30 years of age, about 34.5% of people said they use social networks for over two hours a day, and 26.1% responded to spend more than two hours on the apps instant messaging. Among the age of age at the age of 31, 13.1% of people spent more than two hours on social networks, and 8.8% on messaging apps.
Entangled in the network. More than a third of the subjects between 16 and 30 years of age showed, responding to the questionnaire, all the symptoms of an addiction to social media, such as neglecting the family, work or school to spend time on social networks, several times a week . Within the Over 31 group, 12% of the interviewees were in this situation.
Illusory contacts. If the spending more than two hours on social networks was related to an important increase in the prevalence of perceived solitudethe reason for this is perhaps to be sought in the way we are on social media: intense use passive of social media has in fact seemed correlated with an increase in the sense of solitude and – paradoxically, being social networks – of disconnection.
On the sidelines to look. By passive use we intend to passively scale the contents of others without any interaction, likes or comments, as external observers. Active use instead refers to the habit of posting, commenting, interacting with other users. These two modalities have already been connected in the past to opposite emotional experiences of social networks: with active use they increase the sense of connection and social support; With the passive one, negative emotions such as envy, depression, anxiety grow.
The intensive use of instant messaging apps such as WhatsApp, or Messenger, but also the active use of social networks, have not been related to a high prevalence of solitude.
A complex theme. Recall that the one that emerged it is a correlation and not a relationship of the effect effect: it is not said that social networks make us feel alone; It could be that sunny people have more free time from social commitments and choose more often to spend it online. However, the distinction between the two different ways of using social networks reminds us that The “time spent online” issue is important, but it is not the only one to take into accountwhen you seek the roots of modern solitude in the use of social media.
