Research Symposium

BIO

Emie is a third year at Florida State majoring in psychology, with a minor and special interest in women's studies. She aims to counsel, speak, and write about mental health associated with body image, disordered eating, self-confidence, sexual health, and exercise. She aspires to later obtain her PhD and work as a professor of psychology or women’s studies.

Social media Use and Happiness During Covid-19

Abstract

Through the COVID-19 pandemic, students and teens have been challenged with learning remotely and relying ever more on technology to interact with each other. Our study investigates teen social media use and ratings of happiness. Focusing on the positive and negative attributes the participants feel utilizing distance learning and online friendships, we expand this investigation to include the changes in the personal habits and mental health of the participants. There were 43 participants from ages 12-18. Participants were interviewed twice for 1 hour with a researcher and kept week-long video diaries where they recounted their day and their use of social media. This was done for the summer of 2020 and 2021. Using the interviews and the personal video diaries, we utilize Qualtrics forms to code the data into the social media, personal habits, and schooling categories. We expect to find that most teens acknowledge social media as a positive attribute to their happiness with overuse generating negative effects on their happiness. To date, this research project is still in the preliminary phase, and in the future, it will be used to further expand our knowledge on mental health and social media usage.

Keywords: Social Media, Happiness, Teens