With a thorough new study that demonstrated the same association over time, a social scientist at the University at Buffalo has expanded on a body of work that has previously suggested a link between social media use and inflammation.
The findings raise intriguing questions about the nature of social media use and what may be driving a relationship that is contributing to an alarming number of physical and mental health issues.
“The results showed that the amount of social media use, assessed objectively by a screen-time app, was not only associated with higher inflammation at a single time point, but also increased levels of inflammation five weeks later. This study adds to the growing amount of evidence pointing to the risks of spending too much time on social media and the domains that are being affected,”
Said lead author David Lee, Ph.D., an assistant professor of communication in the UB College of Arts and Sciences.
Effects of Chronic Inflammation
Inflammation is a property of the immune system, has two types, acute and chronic.
“Acute inflammation,” which includes symptoms like redness around a cut finger, congestion from a cold, and ankle edema from a turn, is the body’s reaction to injury and infection.
On the contrary, a considerable body of evidence indicates that common occurrences, including stress, loneliness, poor diet, insufficient exercise, and sleep deprivation, can also induce “chronic inflammation,” the subject of Lee’s research.
Chronic inflammation is detectable in the blood through the measurement of C-reactive protein levels, despite the fact that it may not be visually apparent like acute inflammation.
The long-term effects of chronic inflammation have been associated with cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, and mental health disorders. Lee is investigating probable links between social media use, inflammation, and depression in a five-year study.
Temporal Directionality
In two respects, the present paper is distinct from Lee’s earlier work. It offers the initial longitudinal evidence suggesting that prolonged use of social media may contribute to an increase in inflammation.
“Our initial work looked at the relation between social media use and inflammation at one time point,” says Lee. “But that study didn’t tell us if social media use was driving inflammation or inflammation was driving social media use.”
The current study’s design established temporal directionality, which means that social media use predicts higher levels of inflammation later on.
According to Lee, another contribution of the current paper is that it evaluates the effects of social media use objectively using a screen-time app rather than relying on participants’ memories of how much time they spent on social media.
“Studies show that people may not always be accurate in remembering precisely how much time they spent on the various types of social media apps they use daily. This may be problematic if you’re interested in understanding the effects of screen time on social media. By using the screen time app, we are more confident about the relation between amount of social media use and inflammation, which is also robust against any survey response errors or bias because it was obtained through the blood,”
said Lee.
C-reactive Protein Levels
171 young adult participants were enrolled in the study by Lee’s research team, which consisted of Jennifer Crocker, Ph.D., emeritus professor of psychology at The Ohio State University; Tao Jiang, Ph.D., postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Policy Research; Baldwin Way, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology at Ohio State University; and Baldwin Crocker, Ph.D., emeritus professor of psychology at Ohio State. Baseline C-reactive protein levels were determined during the observation period and compared to another measurement at the conclusion of the study. Screen time was assessed across four social media platforms via an application: X (previously known as Twitter), Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat.
The increased levels of inflammation observed in study participants hasn’t manifested itself as current health problems, but inflammation in youth can predict the onset of disease later in life, according to Lee.
“The relation between social media use and inflammation presents an intriguing opportunity for future research that might explain why this is happening. Given the prevalence of social media use in our daily lives, more research is needed to investigate these potential health effects using diverse methodologies. The next crucial step is to move beyond measures of screen time to really understand how and why social media use can have these effects,”
he said.
Abstract
Background: Although many studies have examined the impact of social media use (SMU) on mental health, very few studies have examined the association of SMU with health-relevant biomarkers.
Objective: Addressing this gap, we conducted a short-term longitudinal study examining the link between SMU and C-reactive protein (CRP), a biological marker of systemic inflammation predictive of major depression, chronic diseases, and mortality.
Methods: We measured college students’ weekly amount of SMU for 5 consecutive weeks objectively via the Screen Time app and collected blood samples at baseline and 5 weeks later.
Results: In separate cross-sectional analyses conducted at phase 1 (baseline) and at phase 2 (5 weeks after baseline), objective SMU had a positive, concurrent association with CRP at both time points. Critically, in a longitudinal analysis, more SMU between phase 1 and phase 2 predicted increased CRP between these time points, suggesting that increased SMU led to heightened inflammation during that period.
Conclusions: Although more research is needed to understand why SMU led to higher inflammation, the association between objective SMU and a marker of a biological process critical to physical health presents an intriguing opportunity for future research on social media effects.
Reference:
- Lee D, Jiang T, Crocker J, Way B . Social Media Use and Its Concurrent and Subsequent Relation to a Biological Marker of Inflammation: Short-Term Longitudinal Study. J Med Internet Res 2023; 25:e46309 doi: 10.2196/46309