Date of Award

2022-05-01

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Department

Psychology

Advisor(s)

Theodore V. Cooper

Abstract

Social media use has continued to rise over the last decade. This behavioral addiction shares essential components with substance addictions (e.g., mood modification, withdrawal). Dysfunctional core beliefs have recently been investigated in relation to Internet addiction and problematic Facebook use, but not with social media addiction specifically. Similarly, mindfulness-based interventions have been developed for various types of technology-related behavioral addictions, yet the relationship between dispositional mindfulness and social media addiction remains unexplored. This study investigated the relationships between these constructs among Latinx undergraduates within the context of social cognitive theory. Participants (n=386; 80.3% female) completed an online survey that assessed social media use frequency, mindfulness practice, social media addiction, positive and negative core beliefs of self and others, and mindfulness facets. Descriptive analyses suggested that social media use was high (M = 22.38 hours, SD = 17.28 hours), and 18.6% of participants scored in the addicted range using a conservative threshold for social media addiction. Primary inferential analyses indicated that: greater dysfunctional beliefs of self and others were associated with higher social media addiction; regarding mindfulness facets, enhanced observance of internal and external events was associated with greater social media addiction, yet maintaining a more aware, nonjudgmental, and nonreactive outlook related to decreased social media addiction. Moderation analyses suggested that greater awareness and nonjudgment demonstrated a protective effect on the relationship between dysfunctional core beliefs of self and social media addiction. In contrast, labeling inner experiences with words and being nonjudgmental of those showed both protective and adverse influences on the relationship between negative core beliefs of others and social media addiction. These findings emphasize the importance of differentially examining the influence of dispositional mindfulness facets on the relationship between dysfunctional core beliefs and social media addiction. Future directions include prospectively examining an adaptation of Weaver & Swank's (2019) mindfulness-based social media addiction intervention to include cognitive-behavioral strategies and cultural adaptations relevant to the treatment sample.

Language

en

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Size

91 p.

File Format

application/pdf

Rights Holder

Mariany Gainza Perez

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