Over 210 million people worldwide suffer from social media addiction.

In this post, I'll give you all the social media addiction statistics you need to be aware of to moderate your social media use.

Overall, 40 percent of U.S. online users aged 18 to 22 years reported feeling addicted to social media. During the April 2019 survey, five percent of respondents from that age group stated that they felt the statement "I am addicted to social media" described them completely.

The results might surprise you when looking at internet users that are active on social media in each country.

56.8% of the world’s total population is active on social media.

90% of people aged 18-29 use social media in some form. 15% of people aged 23-38 admit that they are addicted to social media.

Gen Z and Millennials are the biggest social media users of all age groups.

Today the average time spent on social media is 2 hours and 24 minutes today for people aged 16 to 64.

The average person has 8-9 social media accounts. This has doubled since 2013, when the average person just had 4-5 accounts.

Characteristics of study participants (n = 2926).

Hypothesis testing, path coefficients and their 95% Confidence Intervals (CIs) for time interaction.

Background: Facebook addiction is said to occur when an individual spends an excessive amount of time on Facebook, disrupting one’s daily activities and social life. The present study aimed to find out the level of Facebook addiction in the Nepalese context and briefly discuss the crimes associated with its unintended use. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in the Department of Forensic Medicine of Lumbini Medical College. The study instrument was the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale typed into a Google Form and sent randomly to Facebook contacts of the authors. The responses were downloaded in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 16. Results: The study consisted of 103 Nepalese participants, of which 54 (52.42%) were males and 49 females (47.58%). There were 11 participants (10.68%) who had more than one Facebook account. When different approaches were applied it was observed that 8.73% (n=9) to 39.80% (n=41) were addicted to Facebook. Conclusion: When used properly Facebook has its own advantages. Excessive use is linked with health hazards including addiction and dependency. Students who engage more on Facebook will have less time studying leading to poor academic performance.People need to be made aware of the issues associated with the misuse of Facebook Methods A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted in Department of Forensic Medicine of Lumbini Medical College after obtaining ethical approval from the Institutional Review Committee vide the letter IRC-LMC 01-G/019.

The Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale (BFAS) is a questionnaire that comprises of six core features of addiction: salience, mood modification, tolerance, withdrawal, conflict, and relapse.1 Each of the six-core features consists of three questions, making a total of 18 questions. The final BFAS retained one question for each core element of addiction. Only the scores for questions 1, 5, 7, 11, 13 and 16 determine the level of Facebook addiction. Each question is scored on a 5-point Likert scale using anchors of 1: Very rarely and 5: Very often. Higher scores indicate greater Facebook addiction.

Participants scoring 4 (often) or 5 (very often) in four out of six questions were considered to be addicted to Facebook. BASF has put forth two scoring schemes to determine Facebook addiction. As per a polythetic scoring scheme, Facebook addiction was determined by a liberal approach, where a score of 3 or more was observed in at least four of six items; whereas using a conservative approach, a score of 3 or above in all six items determined Facebook addiction by a monothetic scoring scheme.

References:

1. Andreassen CS, Torsheim T, Brunborg GS, Pallensen S. Development of a facebook addiction scale. Psychol Rep. 2012;110:501-17.

Regional use of social media has a significant effect on the male and female social media statistics.

The results of which gender uses which platforms are in.

Facebook and YouTube are still the most used social media platforms today.

Introduction: The use of chatbots in healthcare is an area of study receiving increased academic interest. As the knowledge base grows, the granularity in the level of research is being refined. There is now more targeted work in specific areas of healthcare, for example, chatbots for anxiety and depression, cancer care, and pregnancy support. The aim of this paper is to systematically review and summarize the research conducted on the use of chatbots in the field of addiction, specifically the use of chatbots as supportive agents for those who suffer from a substance use disorder (SUD). Methods: A systematic search of scholarly databases using the broad search criteria of (“drug” OR “alcohol” OR “substance”) AND (“addiction” OR “dependence” OR “misuse” OR “disorder” OR “abuse” OR harm*) AND (“chatbot” OR “bot” OR “conversational agent”) with an additional clause applied of “publication date” ≥ January 01, 2016 AND “publication date” ≤ March 27, 2022, identified papers for screening. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines were used to evaluate eligibility for inclusion in the study, and the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool was employed to assess the quality of the papers. Results: The search and screening process identified six papers for full review, two quantitative studies, three qualitative, and one mixed methods. The two quantitative papers considered an adaptation to an existing mental health chatbot to increase its scope to provide support for SUD. The mixed methods study looked at the efficacy of employing a bespoke chatbot as an intervention for harmful alcohol use. Of the qualitative studies, one used thematic analysis to gauge inputs from potential users, and service professionals, on the use of chatbots in the field of addiction, based on existing knowledge, and envisaged solutions. The remaining two were useability studies, one of which focussed on how prominent chatbots, such as Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri, and Google Assistant can support people with an SUD and the other on the possibility of delivering a chatbot for opioid-addicted patients that is driven by existing big data. Discussion/Conclusion: The corpus of research in this field is limited, and given the quality of the papers reviewed, it is suggested more research is needed to report on the usefulness of chatbots in this area with greater confidence. Two of the papers reported a reduction in substance use in those who participated in the study. While this is a favourable finding in support of using chatbots in this field, a strong message of caution must be conveyed insofar as expert input is needed to safely leverage existing data, such as big data from social media, or that which is accessed by prevalent market leading chatbots. Without this, serious failings like those highlighted within this review mean chatbots can do more harm than good to their intended audience.

The number of Instagram users in the United Kingdom was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 2.1 million users (+7.02 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the Instagram user base is estimated to reach 32 million users and therefore a new peak in 2028. Notably, the number of Instagram users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here with regards to the platform instagram, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).

The number of LinkedIn users in the United Kingdom was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 1.5 million users (+4.51 percent). After the eighth consecutive increasing year, the LinkedIn user base is estimated to reach 34.7 million users and therefore a new peak in 2028. User figures, shown here with regards to the platform LinkedIn, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).

The number of Pinterest users in the United Kingdom was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 0.3 million users (+3.14 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the Pinterest user base is estimated to reach 9.88 million users and therefore a new peak in 2028. Notably, the number of Pinterest users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here regarding the platform pinterest, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period and count multiple accounts by persons only once.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).

Data from a survey held in August 2022 in the United States revealed that the most popular news source among millennials was social media, with 45 percent of respondents reporting daily news consumption on social networks. This was more than double the share who got their news via radio. When it comes to trust, though, social media does not fare well.

Social media and news consumption

As adults of all ages spend more and more time on social media, news consumption via this avenue is likely to increase, but something which could affect this trend is the lack of trust in the news consumers encounter on social platforms. Although now the preferred option for younger audiences, social networks are among the least trusted news sources in the United States, and concerns about fake news remain prevalent.

Young audiences and fake news

Inaccurate news is a major problem which worsened during the 2016 and 2020 presidential election campaigns and the COVID-19 pandemic. A global study found that most Gen Z and Millennial news consumers ignored fake coronavirus news on social media, but almost 20 percent interacted with such posts in the comments section, and over seven percent shared the content. Younger news consumers in the United States were also the most likely to report feeling overwhelmed by COVID-19 news. As younger audiences were the most likely to get their updates on the outbreak via social media, this also made them the most susceptible to fake news, and younger generations are also the most prone to ‘doomscrolling’, an addictive act where the reader pursues and digests multiple negative or upsetting news articles in one sitting.