CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 45Impact of Technology on AdolescentsCOVID-19 and Mental HealthCommunication and COVID-19 Impact

Social Networking Site Use During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Its Associations With Social and Emotional Well-being in College Students: Survey Study

Open access
Tuck, Alison B, Thompson, Renee J·2021·JMIR Formative Research
DOI 10.2196/26513PMC PMC8425400

Published version of a preprint

Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Background: Social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic has reduced the frequency of in-person social interactions. College students were highly impacted, since many universities transferred curriculum from in-person to entirely online formats, physically separating students with little notice. With social distancing, their use of social networking sites (SNSs) likely changed during the COVID-19 pandemic, possibly holding implications for well-being. Objective: This study aimed to determine (1) how components of SNS use (ie, weekly frequency, time per day, habitual use, engagement, enjoyment, addiction, and emotional impact) changed from before to during COVID-19, (2) how these changes in SNS use were associated with pandemic-related social and emotional well-being, and (3) how SNS use and changes in use during the pandemic were associated with loneliness. Methods: College students (N=176) were surveyed during the time when their university campus in the United States was operating online. Participants completed the same SNS use questionnaires twice, once with regard to the month preceding the onset of COVID-19 and again with regard to the month since this time. They also reported the extent to which they experienced perceived change in social support resulting from the pandemic, pandemic-related stress, and general loneliness. Results: After the onset of COVID-19, participants showed an increase in daily time spent on SNSs (t169=5.53, d=0.42, P<.001), habitual use (t173=3.60, d=0.27, P<.001), and addiction (t173=4.96, d=0.38, P<.001); further, enjoyment on SNSs decreased (t173=–2.10, d=–0.16, P=.04) and the emotional impact of SNS activities became more negative (t172=–3.76, d=–0.29, P<.001). Increased perceived social support during COVID-19 was associated with changes in frequency of SNS use, time per day, addiction, and engagement (r>0.18 for all). Pandemic-related stress was associated with changes in SNS addiction and the extent to which one’s SNS content was related to the pandemic (r>0.20 for all). Loneliness was positively associated with SNS addiction (r=0.26) and negatively associated with SNS engagement (r=–0.19) during the pandemic. Loneliness was also negatively associated with changes in habit and engagement (r<–0.15 for all). Conclusions: Findings suggest that components of SNS use are associated with both positive and negative pandemic-related social outcomes, but largely negative pandemic-related emotional outcomes. Further, some components of SNS use are positively associated with loneliness (eg, addiction) while others show a negative association (eg, engagement). These findings provide a more nuanced picture of how SNS use is associated with social and emotional well-being during the time of a global health crisis when in-person interactions are scarce.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.2196/26513

Cites

48 of 48 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Tuck, A. B., & Thompson, R. J.
Affiliations
Washington University in St. Louis (US)
Corresponding author
Tuck, Alison B
ORCID
Venue
JMIR Formative Research
Publisher
JMIR Publications Inc.
Published
2021-09-07
Volume
5
Issue
9
Pages
e26513
ISSN
2561-326X (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.2196/26513
PMC
PMC8425400
OpenAlex
W3178230115
Cited by
45
References
47
Citations by year
2026: 4 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 16 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 6
FWCI
12.47
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by
Locations
  • JMIR Formative Research (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › COVID-19 and Mental Health
  • Social Sciences › Communication › Communication and COVID-19 Impact
Keywords
social networking sites, COVID-19 pandemic, university students, loneliness, social well-being, emotional well-being, social media addiction, social media engagement, social support, pandemic stress, social distancing, online learning

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review