Investigating the Relationship Between Sleep Health, Depression, and Social Media Usage among Adolescents

In a rapidly evolving digital society, the active engagement of adolescents on social media platforms has progressively increased. This study examines the relationships between depression, sleep health, and social media usage mainly among adolescents, along with a subset of undergraduates and working adults to explore other underlying reasons. A questionnaire was designed and distributed via the Questionnaire Star platform, yielding 115 respondents and 111 valid responses. The study utilized the Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), and Social Anxiety Scale for Social Media Users (SAS-SMU) to evaluate the three measures. Higher levels of depression are consistently associated with poorer sleep quality and shorter sleep duration; however, the influence of SMU on these variables is neither as direct nor as significant as initially hypothesized. This research provides a preliminary exploration of the concurrent effects of SMU on sleep quality and depression. Future studies should consider additional related variables and undertake longitudinal investigations.