When Facebook is easier than face-to-face: Social support derived from Facebook in socially anxious individuals

By Michaelle Indian, Rachel Grieve. 2014

177 citations recorded by the source corpus.

While the psychological benefits of social support are well-established, it is also clear that for many socially anxious individuals, engaging with face-to-face social networks is problematic. This research examined whether social support derived from an online social network (Facebook) had incremental value in predicting subjective well-being over and above offline social support in socially anxious and non-socially anxious individuals. Individuals with high (N = 105) and low (N = 194) social anxiety completed measures of perceived social support, perceived social support derived from Facebook, and subjective well-being. For the high social anxiety group, Facebook social support explained a significant amount of additional variance in subjective well-being, with offline social support failing to contribute significantly to the model. For the low social anxiety group, Facebook social support did not explain any variance in well-being over and above offline social support. Possible implications of the utility of Facebook for socially anxious individuals are discussed.

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/0905c4c6d845a948965ec9150558f8d03c892dea

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Citations in the corpus

The relationship between Instagram use and indicators of mental health: A systematic review (2021, background): “In contrast, for low socially anxious individuals, Facebook social support did not explain additional variance in well-being above offline social support (Indian & Grieve, 2014).”
How Adolescents Use Social Media to Cope with Feelings of Loneliness and Anxiety During COVID-19 Lockdown (2020, unknown): “21,22 Given the social isolation and anxiety during the COVID-19 lockdown, adolescents especially may self-regulate their emotions using social media.”
Social Media and Mental Health: Benefits, Risks, and Opportunities for Research and Practice (2020, background): “1) Facilitate social interaction • Online interactions may be easier for individuals with impaired social functioning and facing symptoms • Anonymity can help individuals with stigmatizing conditions connect with others • Young adults with mental illness appear to commonly form online relationships ”
Personality, motives and metacognitions as predictors of problematic Facebook Use in university students (2016, background): “For example, it has been recognized as a positive tool for anxious people to increase their perceived social support (Indian & Grieve, 2014) and for adolescents to improve their civic engagement skills (Lenzi, Vieno, Altoè, Scacchi, Perkins, Zukauskiene, & Santinello, 2015).”
Social Networking Sites, Depression, and Anxiety: A Systematic Review (2016, background): “Grieve et al [113] demonstrated that higher levels of Facebook social connectedness were related to lower levels of depression and anxiety and higher levels of subjective well-being (life satisfaction).”