Around the world, people display maladaptive, problematic use of online social networking sites (SNSs), like Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram. The symptoms of this problematic SNS use are similar to symptoms of substance use and behavioral addictive disorders, such as relapse when attempting to quit. Individuals with substance use and behavioral addictive disorders also display increased risk-taking when making decisions, but little research has investigated decision making with respect to problematic SNS use. We therefore assessed risky decision making and problematic SNS use by utilizing the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). In line with previous research on behavioral addictive disorders, we hypothesized that greater problematic SNS use would be linked with greater risk-taking. To address our hypothesis, we conducted three studies in which we administered the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale to assess problematic SNS use and related scores to BART performance. Collectively, and counter to our initial hypothesis, we found a negative association between problematic SNS use and risk-taking. Specifically, the more problematic one’s SNS use, the less risk they took, but this risk aversion only occurred after receiving negative feedback on previous decisions and then encountering a situation with less actual risk. Implications of this novel finding are discussed.

Background and aimsPeople can engage in excessive, maladaptive use of social media platforms. This problematic social media use mirrors substance use disorders with regard to symptoms and certain behavioral situations. For example, individuals with substance use disorders demonstrate aberrations in risk evaluations during decision making, and initial research on problematic social media use has revealed similar findings. However, these results concerning problematic social media use have been clouded by tasks that involve learning and that lack a clear demarcation between risky and ambiguous decision making. Therefore, we set out to specifically determine the relationship between problematic social media use and decision making under both risk and ambiguity, in the absence of learning.MethodsWe assessed each participant's (N = 90) self-reported level of problematic social media use. We then had them perform the wheel of fortune task, which has participants make choices between a sure option or either a risky or ambiguous gamble. In this way, the task isolates decisions made under risk and ambiguity, and avoids trial-to-trial learning. Results: We found that the greater an individual's problematic social media use, the more often that individual choses high-risk gambles or ambiguous gambles, regardless of the degree of ambiguity.Discussion and conclusionsOur findings indicate that greater problematic social media use is related to a greater affinity for high-risk situations and overall ambiguity. These findings have implications for the field, specifically clarifying and extending the extant literature, as well as providing future avenues for research.

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