CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 60Impact of Technology on AdolescentsCOVID-19 and Mental HealthStudent Stress and Coping

Problematic social media use, satisfaction with life, and levels of depressive symptoms in university students during the COVID-19 pandemic: Mediation role of social support

Open access
Çi̇çek, İlhan, Emin Şanlı, Mehmet, Arslan, Gökmen, Yıldırım, Murat·2024·Psihologija
DOI 10.2298/psi220613009c
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate whether social support might mediate the relationship between problematic social media use (PSMU) and satisfaction with life, and depressive symptoms. The participants of this study consisted of 579 university students ranging in age between 1738 years (M = 21.66, SD = 3.06). Participants completed the Multidimensional Perceived Social Support Questionnaire, the Depression, Anxiety, Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21), the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale, and the Satisfaction with Life Scale. The results showed that the majority of participants (78.1%) spent an increasing time on social media owing to COVID-19. PSMU significantly predicted satisfaction with life, depressive symptoms, and social support. Social support predicted significantly both satisfaction with life and depressive symptoms. Results of the mediation analysis revealed that a pathway in which social support mediates the relationships between the PSMU and depressive symptoms and satisfaction with life is possible. These results suggest that social support may be an important psychological mechanism that mitigates the influence of PSMU on mental health.

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 · 10.2298/psi220613009c

Cites

123 of 123 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

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Most of the prospective studies in the review found that loneliness predicted symptoms of depression and anxiety amid the pandemic period.

    “Although longitudinal associations were more complex, most of the prospective studies in the review found that loneliness predicted symptoms of depression and anxiety amid the pandemic period”

    From A Longitudinal Study of Loneliness Before the End of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Trajectories, Predictors, and Impact on Chinese Adolescent Mental Health (2024) · cites this paper as [47]

    The Limitations section describes this study as cross-sectional, not a review of prospective studies. A search for loneliness found it only in a reference title; no passage reports whether loneliness predicted depression or anxiety during the pandemic. Pages were not available in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.76)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

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

Research works printed but not linked: 8

  1. 1568887 · DOI
  2. v7n13p261 · DOI
  3. Lavin, K., Goeke-Morey, M. C., & Degnan, K. A. (2020). The role of self-compassion in college students' perceived social support. Journal of Positive Psychology and Wellbeing, 4(1), 41-40.
  4. ijrms20131109 · DOI
  5. S250961 · DOI · Paper page
  6. Tanhan, A., Çiçek, İ., Uğur, E., Nalbant, A., & Kalenderoglu, A. (2022). Counseling's Effect on Psychological Flexibility: A Quasi Experimental Study. E-International Journal of Educational Research, 13(2), 74-89.
  7. rsln5 · DOI
  8. Yildirim, M., Iqbal, N., Khan, M. M., O'Reilly, M., & Vostanis, P. (2020). Psychosocial needs and supports for street children in India: stakeholder perspectives: psychosocial supports for street children. International Journal of Child Development and Mental Health, 8(2), 19-28.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Çi̇çek, I., Emin Şanlı, M., Arslan, G., & Yıldırım, M.
Affiliations
  • Batman University (TR)
  • Health Vocational School, Batman University, Batman, Turkey
  • Ağrı İbrahim Çeçen University (TR)
Corresponding author
Yıldırım, Murat
ORCID
Venue
Psihologija
Publisher
National Library of Serbia
Published
2024
Volume
57
Issue
2
Pages
177-197
ISSN
  • 0048-5705 (ISSN-L)
  • 1451-9283
DOI
10.2298/psi220613009c
OpenAlex
W4380085616
Cited by
60
References
121
Citations by year
2026: 15 · 2025: 32 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 3
FWCI
25.89
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Psihologija (publishedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › COVID-19 and Mental Health
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Student Stress and Coping
Keywords
social media addiction, social support, life satisfaction, depressive symptoms, university students, COVID-19 pandemic, mediation, mental health

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