The social media scale for depression in adolescence.

ABSTRACT: Social media forms a significant part of adolescents' lives, yet its impact on depression is unclear. We aimed to develop a questionnaire assessing different ways of using social media, and use it to understand potential associations with depression in adolescence. One thousand one hundred and forty adolescents completed an item pool. Factor analyses were conducted to derive the Social Media Scale (SMS). Ant Colony Optimization was used to develop a short-form SMS containing the factors which uniquely predicted depression as determined by structural equation modelling. The 45-item, nine-factor, SMS, had an acceptable model fit. Five factors (Social comparison; Passing time; Hostility from others; Hostility towards others; and Seeking support) uniquely contributed to depression and together

SUBMITTER: Twivy E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7617924 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature