Objective Social Media Use and Well-Being: An Actual Behavior Study

Abstract

A myriad of research has examined how time spent on social networking sites (SNSs) impacts users’ well-being; however, the results are inconsistent. Recent criticism has been that measuring time spent on SNSs with self-reported assessments is prone to errors. In the present study, we address this limitation by assessing participants’ actual SNS use via the screen time feature on their smartphones. This way, we can relate the objectively measured SNS use of 383 respondents to several markers of well-being. Findings reveal that objective overall SNS use on smartphone apps is not a good predictor of well-being. A deeper look at the nine examined apps suggests that only time spent on TikTok and Snapchat is negatively linked to well-being as manifested via increased negative affect, anxiety, and depression. The pitfalls and benefits of using screenshots of the screen time feature as an objective measure for SNS use are discussed and future steps are outlined.