Online Social Networking Sites and Mental Health Research

摘要

Socializing and networking was transformed in the technological era by the introduction of social networking sites (SNSs). These online sites contain an abundance of information about individual preferences, interests, types, and frequency of social interactions, etc. However, scientific studies that have utilized SNS activity data to aid our understanding of mental health disorders are scarce. This is partly due to the practicalities of accessing SNS data and methodological issues of large-scale data collection, but also because the construct validity of SNS measures is unknown. By and large, the literature to date has attempted to link various SNSs measures to various mental health symptomologies, mostly collected using self-report measures rather than data generated by SNSs. Although such research has demonstrated some preliminary and putative associations between SNS activity and mental health measures, the current literature is still in its infancy and arguably lacks rigor in design, offering limited insights into its theoretical significance and plausibility. In this review, we will provide an account of the theoretical importance of using data generated from SNSs in mental health research and provide a brief overview of the literature published in this area to date. Introduction The world of socializing and networking was reinvented in the technological era by the introduction of online SNSs and other forms of digital social media such as MySpace, Bebo, Hi5, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google, Instagram, and Vine. The shift into the digital online environment has left social networking users with digital footprints that generate a relatively unique set of identifiers, both in online and offline worlds. In 2012, Facebook (one such SNS) reached a staggering one billion monthly users ( 1 ) meaning that approximately 1/7th of the world’s population were regular Facebook users. Usage is especially high among young people. Livingstone et al. ( 2 ) reported that 26% of 9- to 10-year-olds, 49% of 11- to 12-year-olds, 73% of 13- to 14-year-olds, and 82% of 15- to 16-year-olds have their own profile on an SNS. Moreover, 51% of 13- to 18-year-olds log on to their online social networking profile at least once a day, 34% log on more than once a day, and 22% check it more than 10 times per day ( 3 ). These figures provide insight into the extremely popular online culture of SNSs, especially among young people. Why Study Social Networking Sites in Mental Health Research? The extraordinary popularity of online SNSs does not alone warrant their use for research purposes; therefore, it is important to understand what SNSs add to existing methodology in the field of mental health research. SNS activity logs leave behind a digital trail of quantifiable and objective data that can be arguably valuable to researchers. It may be thought of as analogous or complementary to observing individuals in their natural environment more so than conventional self-report measures of present and past behaviors, which may result in reporting bias in adolescents ( 4 ). Such biases could be in the form of reporting distorted behaviors, which are in fact demand characteristics, which may be less problematic in large datasets and also in digital trails of SNSs. As such, creating and maintaining friendships, interactions with friends, cyber-bullying, specific interests, etc., could potentially be assessed more directly and with greater accuracy and precision using online information. Issues surrounding self-report methods such as test–retest reliability may be overcome by using online activity logs. Some SNSs enable users to have a virtual existence with personal sociodemographic details (e.g., name, age, current, and previous towns/countries of residence all available to view). Such advances in social networking and internet technology offer mental health researchers new tools and opportunities for large-scale data collection, analysis, and interpretation that were previously not possible. Several studies have shown evidence that social network profiles convey fairly accurate personality portrayals rather than idealized virtual identities of profile owners ( 5 ). Most typically, friendships are formed in an offline-to-online sequence; peer-reviewed statements about their friend’s offline interests and values support the accuracy of their online identities [reviewed by Wilson et al. ( 6 )]. While arguably some profile users might engage in self-enhancement and narcissistic self-promotion, research has shown that independent raters can accurately detect such profiles as narcissistic behaviors ( 7 ). Facebook recently reported that 8.7% of Facebook user profiles were “fake” ( 8 ). However, only ~1.5% were actually defined as “undesirable profiles” (i.e., profiles that breached Facebook terms and conditions). The remaining fake profiles included such things as duplicate profiles for business and organization purposes or to create non-human pr