Social Media as a Healing Counterspace: Supporting Mental Health, Well-Being, and Community for Black College Students

Abstract Mental health inequities among Black college students remain a persistent concern in higher education, particularly within urban-serving institutions where students navigate racialized campus climates alongside extensive digital engagement. While early scholarship frequently framed social media as a risk factor for psychological distress, emerging research complicates this narrative by highlighting its potential as a culturally affirming and relational space. This structured literature review synthesizes interdisciplinary scholarship to examine how social media may function as a healing counterspace for Black college students. Drawing on Black counterspace theory, healing-centered engagement, and multiliteracies frameworks, the review situates digital practices within broader structural inequities while foregrounding Black students’ agency in constructing online communities of care. The literature demonstrates that digital platforms support identity affirmation, communal coping, political meaning making, and relational validation, processes that may buffer race-based stress and supplement formal mental health services.Particular attention is given to urban institutional contexts, where geographic and digital communities intersect and where online spaces may extend or compensate for campus climate limitations. At the same time, the review acknowledges tensions related to digital fatigue, exposure to racialized trauma, and platform power. By integrating theoretical and empirical perspectives, this manuscript advances a strengths-based understanding of Black digital engagement and identifies directions for future research on digital healing practices in higher education.