The Influence of Teenagers Subtle Social Media Interactions on Self-Identity and Psychological Well-Being

In the digital age, social media has become an indispensable component of young people's lives, and invisible small interactions such as likes and comments dominate their online communication. Although previous studies have involved issues such as social media addiction, anxiety, and self-identity, they have not yet explored in depth how these interactions affect adolescents' self-identity, physical and mental health, and the association mechanism between such interactions and self-existence and anxiety. This study takes social media praise pursuit and self-existence anxiety as the core, uses literature review and logical analysis methods to define the core concepts of social media addiction, praise anxiety and self-existence, and examines two key relationships: the relationship between social media use and anxiety level, and the relationship between social media use and self-existence. The study found that social media use was positively correlated with adolescent anxiety (mainly triggered by upward social comparisons and unmet interaction expectations); praise anxiety will restrict self-worth and make adolescents more sensitive to certain comments. Improper use of social media can impair the perception of self-existence. On the contrary, positive interaction can mitigate such negative effects. This study enriches the research in the field of social media and adolescent psychology, and provides practical implications: such as cultivating adolescents' awareness of interactive disenchantment, optimizing platform design, and strengthening parental guidance, so as to alleviate adolescents' social media and other related anxiety.