Dropping social media lifts depression, study suggests

TAKING a week’s holiday from social media improves wellbeing, lowers anxiety and alleviates depression, a study suggests.

Researchers at the University of Bath said the results showed that regular breaks could be recommended to help people manage their mental health.

“Many of our participants reported positive effects from being off social media, with improved mood and less anxiety overall.

“This suggests that even just a small break can have an impact,” said Dr Jeff Lambert, lead researcher from Bath’s Department for Health.

For the research, 154 volunteers aged between 18 and 72, who used social media every day for an average of eight hours a week, were asked to either continue their usual routine or take a break for a week.

For those who took a week off, average wellbeing scores increased from 46 to 55, a 19 per cent rise, on the Warwicked in burgh Mental Wellbeing Scale.

Similarly, depression scores fell 35 per cent from 7.56 to 4.84 on the Patient Health Questionnaire, which rates 0-4 points as no depression and 5-9 as mild depression, suggesting a week’s break could tip people from mild depression.

Anxiety scores also fell from 5.95 to 3.88, a 34 per cent decline on the General Anxiety Disorder Scale.

While there were also improvements in the group who did not take a break, these changes were far smaller than those who took seven days off.

Dr Lambert said: “Scrolling social media is so ubiquitous that many of us do it almost without thinking from the moment we wake up to when we close our eyes at night. We know that social media usage is huge and that there are increasing concerns about its mental health effects.

“So with this study, we wanted to see whether simply asking people to take a week’s break could yield mental health benefits.

“Of course, social media is a part of life and for many people, it’s an indispensable part of who they are and how they interact with others. But if you are spending hours each week scrolling and you feel it is negatively impacting you, it could be worth cutting down on your usage to see if it helps.” The number of people using social media has rapidly increased in recent years. In 2011, around 45 per cent of people said they used sites and apps, but that rose to 71 per cent by 2021.

Among 16 to 44-year-olds, as many as 97 per cent use social media. The team now want to build on the study to see if a break has larger impacts for younger age groups, and they are keen to see how long the possible affect may last.

The results were published in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behaviour and Social Networking.