Will Social Media Contagion Harm Teens in Non-Western Societies? The Bangladesh Case (Poster 4)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Friday 1:30 p.m.
  In Poster Session: Examining Adolescents' Experiences With Social Media and Gaming

Abstract

Twenge (2017) and Haidt (2024) summarize empirical research indicating that the spread of social media in the West, particularly the U.S., has had negative impacts on mental health for people under 25. Yet researchers largely ignore such relationships outside the West. Here, we suggest that relationships between internet use and mental health will be truncated in less individualistic developing countries, which are typically stronger family and community relationships. Using a unique mental health survey of 600 Bangladesh undergraduates, using structural equation modeling, we find that the number of hours spent on the social media has a statistically significant relationship with depression (at 1% level), marginally significant (at 10% level) for stress, and not statistically significant for anxiety.

Authors

• Md Juwel Ahmed Sarker, University of Arkansas at Fayetteville

• Robert A. Maranto, University of Arkansas