Taking a break from social media is good for your health and increases your sense of well-being. This is demonstrated by a study coordinated by the University of Bath and published in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking, which asked a group of people aged between 18 and 72 (average age 29) to stop using social media for a week. For some participants this meant gaining around nine hours of time for themselves, which they would otherwise have spent on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and TikTok.
The study involved 154 people who spent an average of 8-9 hours a week on social media. After measuring the levels of
depression, anxiety and well-being of all participants, some of them were asked to suspend the use of social media for 7 days or drastically reduce it to a few minutes.
A week later, the researchers observed significant differences between the scores for well-being, anxiety and depression of the group without social media and those of the control group. In particular, in terms of well-being, the group that had suspended the use of social media recorded 4.9 points more than the others, while the levels of depression and anxiety had dropped by 2.2 points and 1.7 points respectively.
“Scrolling social media has become so common that many of us do it almost without thinking, but there are growing concerns about the effects of these tools on mental health”, says Jeff Lambert, first author of the study.
Researchers know well that social media are part of people's lives and that for many they have become a tool
essential for expressing oneself and interacting. However, Lambert notes, "many of the participants in our research reported positive effects from stopping social media use, with improved mood and less anxiety in general. Our study suggests that even just a small break can have a positive impact."
For researchers, however, the effects of suspending the use of social media for long periods remain to be investigated (ANSA).
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