Social Anxiety and Self-control Desire for Social Media Users: The Mediating Roles of Resilience and Social Media Usage

There is a growing concern about the emergence of problematic patterns of use among social media users. Although previous research suggests that high social anxiety is associated with poor self-control in social interactions, studies on this topic for social media users are limited. This study examined the relationship between social anxiety and self-control among university students who are social media users. Mediation analysis investigated the roles of resilience and social media usage time as mediators of the effect of these relationships. The participants of the study consisted of 394 university students. The results confirmed that self-control desire causes social anxiety and resilience has mitigating effects. Although self-control affected the duration of social media use, the duration of social media use did not significantly affect social anxiety. Therefore, this research provides a process explanation for the effect of self-control on social anxiety in social media users. Further theoretical and practical implications and future research directions are discussed.