Year: 2025
Type: preprint
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Friends are a central part of adolescents' social and emotional development, and social media affordances reflect and extend these dynamics by enabling continuous engagement with peers, including monitoring social interactions and managing online reputation. Despite the prominence of both friendships and social media in adolescent life, research examining their intersection remains limited. This cross-sectional study of 684 adolescents from three rural middle schools in the southeast United States (Mage = 15.32; SD = .649; 48.5% female) used linear network autocorrelation modeling to assess patterns of similarity in social media motivations and habitual use among friends. The findings indicated a significant positive relationship between an adolescent’s reported use of social media for social reputation, social surveillance, and habitual social media use, and the behaviors reported by their friends. These results underscore the presence of shared tendencies within adolescent peer networks, highlighting the relevance of social connections in understanding adolescent social media use.
Authors: Jolien Trekels, David B Jack, Jimmy Capella, Mitchell J Prinstein, Eva H. Telzer
Institutions: KU Leuven, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W4411642644