Associations Between Social Media, Bedtime Technology Use Rules, and Daytime Sleepiness Among Adolescents: Cross-sectional Findings From a Nationally Representative Sample

Abstract

Background Social media use is associated with poor sleep among adolescents, including daytime sleepiness, which affects adolescents’ mental health. Few studies have examined the associations among specific aspects of social media, such as frequency of checking and posting, perceived importance of social media for social belonging, and daytime sleepiness. Identifying whether certain adolescents are more at risk or protected from the effects of social media on sleepiness may inform future interventions for social media, sleep, and mental health. Objective This study aims to examine the association between social media use frequency and importance, daytime sleepiness, and whether the perceived importance of social media for social interactions and parental rules around bedtime technology moderated these relationships. Methods This cross-sectional survey study was conducted with a sample of 4153 adolescents from across the United States. Qualtrics was used to collect data via panel recruitment from a national sample representing the US demographics of teens aged 12 to 17 years. Participants completed measures of daytime sleepiness, frequency of social media checking and posting, and the importance of social media for social interactions. Parents reported whether they had a household rule around bedtime media and screen use. Hierarchical regressions and moderation analyses were conducted, covarying for age, gender, and age at first smartphone use. Results Participants had a mean age of 14.64 (SD 1.66) years in grades 6 to 12, 46.45% (1929/4153) identified as female, and 67.93% (2821/4153) identified as White. The results indicated that adolescents who posted (B=0.70, SE 0.04; P<.001) or checked (B=0.76, SE 0.04; P<.001) social media more frequently or who perceived social media to be more important for social belonging (B=0.36, SE 0.02; P<.001) had higher levels of daytime sleepiness. Moderation analyses indicated that the relationship between social media use frequency and daytime sleepiness was exacerbated by higher levels of perceived social media importance (B=0.04, SE 0.01; P<.001). Adolescents without household rules around bedtime technology use were more likely to be affected by social media checking (B=−0.34, SE 0.09; P<.001) and importance (B=−0.16, SE 0.04; P<.001) on daytime sleepiness. Conclusions The findings suggest that social media use frequency and perceived importance of social interactions are associated with daytime sleepiness among adolescents. It is important to consider youth’s perceptions of social media when assessing the potential effects of social media use frequency on youth well-being. Furthermore, youth who did not have parental rules around bedtime technology use were most likely to be affected by social media use and perceived importance. The findings may extend to other mental health outcomes and may guide future prevention and intervention programs designed to improve social media use, sleep, and mental health.

Social Media Use and Health-Related Quality of Life Among Adolescents: Cross-sectional Study

“…Children who spent more time on social media were more likely to report having some or a lot of problems on the 5 HRQoL dimensions, and report lower self-rated health than those who spent less time on social media. These findings are in line with previous studies demonstrating that social media use among children aged 13 years and older was inversely associated with HRQoL outcomes such as physical health status and psychological well-being [39,40].…”

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) Types and Social Media: Are Social Media Important and Impactful for OCD People?

“…For instance, the Hoarding type of OCD triggered people to collect images from the internet and increased their importance of social media [ 42 ]. Also, previous studies showed that there is a significant relationship between checking behavior, social media, and the importance of social media [ 64 , 65 ].…”

“…The past studies on social media, in the literature, showed us that importance of how social media affects individuals’ way of living and their psychological variables. A study performed on adolescents found that participants’ daytime sleepiness is related to their frequency of use of, and their emphasis on, social media [ 64 ]. The same study also found a significant correlation between the importance of social-media use and participants’ posting on social media and checking (apart from OCD) behavior.…”

Estimation of Bedtimes of Reddit Users: Integrated Analysis of Time Stamps and Surveys

“…In general, researchers do not know the sleep patterns of social media users unless they recruit them for a study; unfortunately, this means that whatever advantages social media data otherwise affords in terms of scale and passive monitoring are lost to sleep research. A special use case of these data would be for understanding the role of social media use in affecting sleep patterns, which is a topic of significant interest [8][9][10][11][12][13][14]. A recent systematic review concluded that the sleep and social media literature is limited by its reliance on surveys and that for the field to move forward, new study designs are needed [15].…”