The more we use and post on social media, the more irritable we are. A study conducted by scientists at the Center for Quantitative Health at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School and published in JAMA Network Open reveals a link between frequent usage of these sites and general irritability, with some sites being worse for mental health than others.

This is important, according to the scientists, as 78.2% of the 42,597 polled adults reported daily use of at least one social media platform. Moreover, higher usage leads to worse irritability, and posting multiple times per day (16.2% of users fall into this category) is associated with the highest irritability scores among all sites, with TikTok, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter) users being the most irritable.

The three sites may help worsen “Brainrot,” Oxford’s word of the year 2024: ‘Deterioration of mental state as a result of excessive consumption of trivial or unengaging online content‘.

Studying social media use the link with anxiety

The authors of the study wanted to understand “the complex association between social media use and mental health” in relation to irritability and anxiety instead of studying its link with depression, which has been analyzed in prior studies, note the researchers.

The scientists also sought to comprehend whether interest in and exposure to political views was associated with irritability, finding that users who partake in more frequent political discussions are more irritable, while those who don’t follow political news not very closely show modest decreases in irritability. No significant difference was observed for political affiliation, according to the study.

Importance of the study

In the survey study of more than 42,500 United States (US) adults in all 50 US states and the District of Columbia, scientists found that frequent users of social media experienced increased levels of irritability, “above and beyond that explained by depression or anxiety.”

The study was based on data gathered from two waves of the Covid States Project, a national nonprobability web-based survey that was conducted from November 2, 2023, to January 8, 2024. The Brief Irritability Test (BITe), a 5-item questionnaire with scores from 5 to 30, was used to measure irritability over the past two weeks. Higher BITe scores indicate greater irritability, which affects emotional regulation and psychological well-being.

Studying irritability is important, according to the authors, as it is linked to anxiety and depression. Moreover, when irritability co-occurs with depression, it might increase the likelihood of suicidal thoughts and behaviours. Furthermore, irritability has also been associated with a higher risk for violence, the researchers underscore.

“Our results suggest an association between high levels of social media use, particularly posting on social media, and irritability among US adults. The implications of this irritability and the potential for interventions to address this association require additional investigation,” the study concludes.