Research Problem

Research Problem

Most young adults in this generation have grown up with smartphones and social media at their disposal 24/7; therefore, it has become a part of most of their daily lives. This poses the question: Where is the line drawn between frequent use and addiction? The recent addition of the “screen time” feature on most mobile devices has made people aware of how much time they spend on their smartphones daily. This feature illustrates how much time is spent on each app, which is beneficial in determining whether most of their time is spent on social media or elsewhere. With everyone at home for the year 2020, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, screen time reports increased. In 2020, novelist Phil Stamper wrote “when I got that [screen time] notification, I found myself flinching at the results . . .” (as cited in Andrews, 2020, para. 9).

One benefit of studying social media use and addiction is that most of the source material is from within the past decade, due to the recent emergence and popularity of these platforms. Recent research studies are on topics such as the following:

●       How social media affects behaviour (Larson, 2021)

●       Variables that predict social media addiction (Ciplak, 2020)

●       The impact of social media addiction on the well-being of students (Zhao, 2021)

●       Social media addiction and the internet (Nakaya, 2015)

The source material on this subject shows that there are harmful effects of high social media use and that it can negatively affect students. Since that has been established, it is first important to determine whether or not young adults in the Edmonton area are addicted to social media before examining its negative effects. Most of these studies also touch on how much time their participants spend on social media; however, there have been no peer-reviewed studies that specifically focus on Canadian young adults, never mind those in the Edmonton region.