Cognitive Behavioral Therapy-Based Short-Term Abstinence Intervention for Problematic Social Media Use: Improved Well-Be
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy-Based Short-Term Abstinence Intervention for Problematic Social Media Use: Improved Well-Being and Underlying Mechanisms Xingchen Zhou 1 & Pei-Luen Patrick Rau 1 & Chi-Lan Yang 2 & Xiaofei Zhou 1 Accepted: 17 September 2020/ # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract
Problematic social media use is detrimental to users’ subjective well-being. Based on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), we proposed a short-term abstinence intervention to treat this problem. A mixed method study with 65 participants was conducted to examine the effectiveness of this intervention and to reveal the underlying mechanisms of how the intervention influences participants. While the experimental group (N = 33) took eight 2.5-h breaks from social media over two weeks and had daily dairies, the control group (N = 32) used social media as usual and had daily diaries. The results demonstrated that the intervention has a positive effect on life satisfaction. The effect varied with the time users conducted abstinence (work hours vs. off hours) and the level of social media addiction (heavy users vs. normal users). Qualitative findings from dairies and interviews unveiled associations among users’ behaviors, feelings, and cognitions during and after abstinence. These results extend the understanding of the CBT-based short-term abstinence intervention and suggest opportunities to alleviate problematic social media use. Keywords Problematic social media use . Well-being . Short-term abstinence . Cognitive behavioral therapy
* Pei-Luen Patrick Rau [email protected] Xingchen Zhou [email protected] Chi-Lan Yang [email protected] Xiaofei Zhou [email protected]
1
Department of Industrial Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
2
Cyber Interface Lab, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Psychiatric Quarterly
Introduction As social media is becoming pervasive in our life, the emerging overuse patterns have caused problems, including poor working performance [1] and many other mental detriments [2, 3]. To date, solutions to problematic social media use are still limited. A few studies on this problem have revealed the benefits of getting away from social media, but they did not answer how to guide healthy usage while still in use. Considering the tight connection between social media and our routine life, completely quitting may be infeasible. Therefore, this study proposes a short-term abstinence intervention based on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to deal with this problem and guide rational use. We conducted a mixed method study to examine the effects of this intervention and reveal the underlying cognitive and behavioral mechanisms.
Problematic Social Media Use Problematic use of social media is a maladaptive behavior [4], which could be identified from symptoms like preoccupation with social media, an inability to control social media use, and continued use despite the negative consequences [5]. Problematic social media use has been found
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