Instagram Usage, Emotional Factors, and Loss of Control Eating Behavior in Adolescents: Disaggregating Between and Within-Person Effects

• In Event: Poster Session 08
  In Poster Session: PS 08 Topic - Technology, Media & Child Development

Abstract

Background: Sociocultural theory of eating disorders emphasizes three contexts that influence how people feel about their bodies: parents, peers, and media (Izydorczyk and Sitnik-Warchulska, 2018). Previous research shows that the use of technology and social media may have detrimental effects on individuals’ physical and mental well‐being, including increased risk for disordered eating behavior (Zeeni, Doumit, Kharma, & Jose Sanchez- Ruiz, 2018). In addition, previous work has shown that individual characteristics impact how adolescents use social media apps and internalize their feelings (Shapero, Abramson, & Alloy, 2018). Leveraging a 7-wave longitudinal study, the current work explores both between and within-person effects of Instagram usage on loss of control (LOC) of eating, a robust precursor to eating disorders, while also assessing intrapersonal factors that may exacerbate this relationship.
Hypotheses: Adolescents who use Instagram more will report more severe LOC eating, as compared to adolescents with average Instagram usage. Moreover, there will be a within-person effect; at times, when adolescents report using Instagram more frequently than their average, they will report concurrent increases in LOC eating. This effect will be stronger for adolescents with more social anxiety and greater emotional reactivity.
Methods: Data were collected as part of a 7-wave longitudinal study. Adolescents attending five public middle schools in the Northeastern United States were invited to participate. The final analysis included 1,011 adolescents aged 11-14 at study onset. Participants completed self-report questionnaires of Instagram use, social anxiety (αrange = .87 – .91), emotional reactivity (αrange = .95 – .97, and LOC eating (αrange = .93 – .96) every 6 months.
Results: Two multilevel models were run using the brms package in R. Model 1 included social anxiety as a between-person predictor, and Model 2 included emotional reactivity as a between-person predictor. LOC eating was regressed on time, gender, and between and within-person Instagram usage in both models. Supporting our hypothesis, more frequent Instagram usage, as compared to the average adolescent, was associated with more severe LOC eating. However, there was no significant within-person effect of Instagram usage on LOC eating. Modeling random effects revealed significant heterogeneity in the influence of Instagram usage on disordered eating behavior across adolescents. The between-person effects of social anxiety and emotional reactivity did not moderate this effect. However, there were main effects, such that adolescents with more social anxiety and higher emotional reactivity had significantly more LOC eating.
Conclusion: The results indicate that adolescents who use Instagram at higher-than-average levels have more severe LOC eating, but that relative individual-level increases in Instagram usage at a single time-point do not significantly influence LOC eating behavior at that concurrent time. Adolescents with more social anxiety and higher emotional reactivity report increased LOC eating, highlighting important individual risk-factors for disordered eating.

Authors

• Barbara Djan, New York University
  Presenting Author

• Ana M. DiGiovanni, Columbia University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Anna Vannucci, Columbia University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Christine McCauley Ohannessian, Florida State University
  Non-Presenting Author