Either you control social media or social media controls you: Understanding the impact of self‐control on excessive social media use from the dual‐system perspective

Abstract

Drawing on dual‐system theories, this study shows that excessive social media users demonstrate a psychological imbalance between the impulsive and reflective systems in their minds. We provide empirical evidence of an inconsistency between conscious attitudes and the actual behavior toward social media. The findings show that excessive users are driven more by their implicit attitudes rather than explicit beliefs in consuming social media. Although a high level of self‐control indicates healthy social media use, the findings suggest that self‐control has no significant influence on excessive users with a positive implicit attitude and high‐impulsive social media use. This duality of self‐control dispels beliefs about its ability to regulate excessive online behaviors. Therefore, this study (1) theorizes what constitutes excessive social media use, (2) outlines how implicit measurements are incorporated in consumer research, and (3) offers practical implications for managing unhealthy online behaviors.

A Moderated Mediation Model Linking Excessive Enterprise Social Media Usage With Job Performance

“…In the context of our study, we propose that excessive ESM usage indicates a large amount of information to handle (Zhang et al, 2020;Zahrai et al, 2022a), which is likely to cause regret. For instance, one basic need to use ESM is to improve communication, interaction, and information exchange among different employees.…”

Self-Control and Consumptive Behavior Control in Purchasing Internet Services for Social Networking Among Muslim Millennials

“…Self-control is identified as one of the psychological aspects that influence purchasing decisions on goods and services. Previous literature searches have claimed that there is a negative impact of social media of Self-control failures on personal well-being (Zahrai et al, 2022). Another study shows the contribution of Self-control in the case of purchasing goods and services among adolescents and finds that good Self-control to live efficiently contributes to reducing consumptive behavior (Halimatussakdiyah et al, 2019).…”

“…Excessive concern from some observers concludes that there is a negative impact of this social networking on consumptive behavior among young people. Zahrai et al (2022) have claimed that there is a negative impact of the Self-control of social media failures on personal well-being. Good Self-control to live efficiently contributes to reducing consumptive behavior (Halimatussakdiyah et al, 2019).…”

Effect of Social Media Sentiment on Donations Received by Npos

“…Previous literature has examined the effect of internet disclosure on received donations, showing a positive association between internet disclosures and NPO donations (Gandía, 2011;Saxton and Wang, 2014). Although these papers focus on the use of NPO websites, recent papers show the increasing relevance of social media in organizations' communication strategy (Lovejoy and Saxton, 2012;Guo and Saxton, 2014;Zahrai et al, 2022). In this line, several studies have examined the association of social media and NPO donations, showing that NPOs with dependence on donations have higher levels of social media use (Gálvez-Rodríguez et al, 2016;Campbell and Lambright, 2019).…”

“…Studies on the use of social media by organizations are interesting because of the differences in user behavior, who tend to behave in a more emotional and impulsive way (Hollebeek et al, 2014;Dwivedi et al, 2019;Zahrai et al, 2022). Nonetheless, to date, no studies have considered how sentiment on social media may affect the donations received by NPOs.…”