“With all your friends in your pocket” – a qualitative study about adolescents’ experiences with social media from a health-promoting perspective

TL;DR

This study explores how social media helps adolescents feel connected and boosts their self-esteem, contributing to their overall mental health.

Contribution

The study introduces a salutogenic perspective on how social media supports adolescent mental health through social connections and self-esteem.

Findings

Social media provides adolescents with social support, reducing loneliness and promoting a sense of belonging.

Adolescents use social media to enhance self-esteem through attention and acceptance from others.

There is a positive interplay between social support and self-esteem that may improve mental health and identity.

Abstract

To explore adolescents’ experiences with social media (SoMe) use from a salutogenic health-promoting perspective.

This qualitative study was based on five focus group interviews (27 adolescents) from two public senior high schools in Norway, (15–18 years). Interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis.

SoMe-use was described as an important part of the adolescents` everyday life and a novel way to relate to the world. The identified main themes were: social support, self-esteem, and their interplay. They experienced social support via SoMe through communication, feeling unity, inclusion, and the establishment of a larger social network, thus preventing loneliness and promoting social belonging. Further, SoMe-use is important for their self-esteem by receiving and providing attention, acceptance, and confirmation. Social support promoted their self-esteem, which in turn enhanced their online self-expression, further reinforcing the social support.

These findings indicate that SoMe might be an important social arena for the development of adolescents’ self-esteem and receiving social support. Further, it seems that there is an interplay between social support and self-esteem that might positively influence their identity, sense of coherence, and mental health. However, we need more in-depth knowledge about adolescents’ experiences with SoMe-use from a salutogenic health-promoting perspective.

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