Psychological Representation and Motivations Behind Adolescents' Internet Meme Usage on Social Media Platforms

With the development of social media, internet memes have gradually become a common part of teenagers' daily online communication. This paper focuses on the use of internet memes among teenagers and explores their psychological characteristics and motivations from the perspectives of group belonging, self-presentation, social recognition, emotion regulation, and secondary creation. The study finds that internet memes are not only used for entertainment, but also play an important role in teenagers' social interactions. By sharing, creating, and responding to memes, teenagers can become more involved in peer groups, express their personalities and emotions, and receive social feedback through likes, comments, and other forms of interaction. At the same time, frequent use of internet memes may also cause some problems, such as the spread of inappropriate content and simplified forms of language expression. Therefore, while recognizing the social and expressive value of internet memes, it is also important to improve teenagers' media literacy and encourage them to participate in online culture in a more rational and responsible way.