Adolescent–Parent Relationship, Internet Expectancy and Social Media Addiction: Moderating Role of Gender

The swift advancement of internet technology has led to social media addiction (SMA) becoming a prevalent issue among adolescents, who exhibit a greater addiction rate compared to the adult population. This study employs a family-centerd approach to investigate the mechanisms affecting SMA, acknowledging the family's pivotal role in adolescent development concerning online behaviour. Toward these objectives, this study will explore the roles of adolescent–parent relationships in SMA and internet expectancy as a mediator in this connection. Further, it examines whether gender acts as the moderator of the relationship. The current work adopted a cross-sectional and causal research design, enabling researchers to explore the interactions among various factors among 515 college students in the North Indian region. The results show that parent–adolescent relationship does affect social media addiction. The study validates a moderate positive association between internet expectancy and social media addiction. The mediation results showed that partial mediation was established for internet expectancy in the connection between the parent–adolescent relationship and social media addiction. The moderation by gender suggests that the parent–adolescent relationship influences social media addiction differently depending on gender. The study offers relevant information concerning the parent–adolescent relationship and the social media addiction among adolescents. This work approaches parent–adolescent relationship from a multidimensional perspective in contrast to earlier studies. From a practical perspective, this research highlights the importance of family-focused treatment interventions to prevent social media addiction among youths.