Exploring the relationship between time spent on social media and depressive symptoms: A network perspective

Introduction: This study examined the relationship between time spent on social networking sites and specific depressive symptoms, addressing a gap in prior research that has primarily centered on problematic use (PSMU) rather than time-based engagement. Method: A symptom-level network approach was used with cross-sectional data from 1,018 university students in Poland (M age = 21.64; 75.4% women), who completed the PHQ-9 and a single-item measure of average daily time spent on social media. Results: All simple correlations between social media use and depressive symptoms were positive but small (r = .10 – .23). The network analysis showed that time spent on social media was most strongly associated with concentration difficulties, followed by insomnia, fatigue, and psychomotor agitation, whereas affective symptoms such as sadness and anhedonia showed no or minimal direct associations. Overall, social media use was more strongly linked to impairments in functional-cognitive processes than to emotional disturbances. Moreover, it was connected primarily to depressive symptoms located at the periphery of the network, suggesting that time-based engagement is linked to less central—but functionally relevant—aspects of depression. Discussion: These findings advance knowledge on how time-based social media engagement relates to depression at the symptom level. By identifying concentration difficulties, sleep-related problems, and psychomotor symptoms as key links of intensive use, the study lays an important foundation for future longitudinal or experimental studies.