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19 May 2016

Be Happy, Use Snapchat!

Keywords: happiness, media, personality, survey, North America, personality characteristics, social media, young adults,

Different types of social media platforms are uniquely related to young adults’ feelings of loneliness and happiness, a study in Computers in Human Behavior shows. Specifically, image-based platforms (Instagram, Snapchat) seem to have the potential to decrease feelings of loneliness and increase feelings of happiness in young adults.

Take aways

  • The more young adults use image-based social media platforms, such as Instagram, the happier and less lonely they are.
  • The use of text-based social media platforms, such as Twitter, is not related to feelings of loneliness and happiness.
  • Parents and friends of lonely and unhappy young adults should know that personal images sent through image-based social media platforms might cheer them up and help improve their situation.

Study information

  • The question?

    What is the relation between the use of different types of social media platforms (image-based versus text-based) and young adults’ feelings of loneliness and happiness?

  • Who?

    253 young adult undergraduate students (mean age: 22.55; 64% male).

  • Where?

    A large university in the northwestern United States.

  • How?

    All students filled out a computerized survey, answering questions about their feelings of loneliness and happiness. Moreover, students were asked whether they regularly used image-based social media platforms (Instagram and Snapchat) and text-based social media platforms (Twitter and Yik Yak).

Facts and findings

  • Young adults’ loneliness was associated with the number of image-based social media platforms that they used (Figure 1):
    • Loneliness was highest among those who did not use any image-based social media platforms.
    • Loneliness was lowest among those who used two image-based social media platforms.
  • Happiness was also related to the number of image-based social media platforms used (Figure 2):
    • Happiness was lowest among those who did not use any image-based social media platforms.
    • Happiness was highest among those who used two image-based social media platforms.
  • Young adults’ feelings of loneliness and happiness did not relate to the number of text-based platforms they used.
  • Remarkable fact: The relation between image-based social media platforms and feelings of loneliness and happiness was even stronger for young adults who did not use any text-based social media platforms at all.
  • Fun fact: Of all social media, young adults used Instagram the most.