The Impact of Social Media to Addictive Behavior and Mental Health Issues: A Structural Equation Modeling Approach

Addiction to social media application is an alarming state of condition where other psychological problems can be shown. This paper presents an analysis between the relationship of social media use to mental health issues in 262 adolescents. In this study, we applied Structural Engineering Modeling (SEM) to analyze factors of social media addiction and how it contributes to mental health issues. We measured mobile usage, emotional investment on social media, sleep quality, self-esteem and levels of stress, anxiety and depression. Results implies that those people who are highly invested in social media experienced poor sleep quality, lower self-esteem and higher levels of stress, anxiety and depression. These findings suggest that excessive use of smartphones due to social media can be linked to negative psychological characteristics and possibly lead to suicidal ideation.