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Background: literature suggests that increased usage of social networking sites (SNSs) can have a detrimental effect on mental wellbeing 1, 2. Furthermore, increased SNS usage has been found to result in the development of a new behavioral addiction: SNS addiction 3. This new form of addiction to social networking is shown to predict depression in users of SNSs 4, 5.: the rates of people who use SNSs are rising, the current study aimed to identify relationships between SNS usage, SNS addiction and depression, with a focus on SNSs used today that have not been researched before, namely Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat.: cross-sectional online study was conducted on a sample of 103 young adults. Each participant filled out a questionnaire consisting of the Centre for Epidemiologic Studies of Depression Scale Revised (CESD-R), Young’s Internet Addiction Test (IAT), along with general questions relating to SNS use.: results of the current study suggest that Instagram use (β =. 24, p ≤. 05) and SNS addiction (β =. 32, p =. 001) were significant predictors of depression. The results also showed that Instagram use predicted SNS addiction (β =. 22, p <. 05). No such relationship existed between Facebook, Twitter or Snapchat and SNS addiction or depression.: results indicated that both Instagram use and SNS addiction were related to depression, and that Instagram use was related to SNS addiction. Results are explained from a uses and gratifications perspective. Further research using longitudinal designs is needed to establish the direction of this relationship.
Ella Donnelly (Wed,) studied this question.