Adolescent social media use and its association with relationships and connections: Canadian Health Behaviour in School-aged Children, 2017/2018.

Background: The development of healthy relationships and connections is of fundamental importance to adolescent well-being. The use of social media plays a vital role in the lives of young Canadians, yet the association between different types of social media use and the quality of relationships and connections remains unknown, and most existing analyses on this topic are based on modest and non-representative samples. Data and methods: Using 2017/2018 reports from the nationally representative Health Behaviour in School-aged Children study (n=17,149; ages 11 to 15 years), the strength, consistency and significance of associations was examined between intensive (frequent use to connect with other people) and problematic (use that depicts addictive qualities) social media use and available measures of adolescent relationships and connections. Results: Overall, intensive use (online communication with others almost all of the time) and problematic use (potential addiction to social media) were more common in girls than boys (38% of girls versus 30% of boys and 7.7% of girls versus 5.2% of boys, respectively), with prevalence levels that rose with age. Intensive use was associated with more positive social relationships with friends, especially among girls (relative risk [RR] = 1.40 [95% confidence interval (CI) 1.28 - 1.54]), while problematic use was consistently and negatively associated with strong relationships and connections in all groups in the study. Notably, problematic use was negatively associated with strong family relationships in boys (RR = 0.58 [95% CI 0.42 to 0.79]) and girls (RR=0.48 [95% CI 0.36 to 0.63]). Interpretation: Intensive use of social media has the potential to strengthen relationships and connections in adolescents. However, when social media use becomes addictive or "problematic", it is highly correlated with weaker relationships and a sense of social disconnection. Public health initiatives related to social media use should consider how different types of social media use have the potential to impact on different aspects of health.

Adolescents' Intense and Problematic Social Media Use and Their Well-Being in 29 Countries.

PURPOSE: This study examined (1) whether intense and problematic social media use (SMU) were independently associated with adolescent well-being; (2) whether these associations varied by the country-level prevalence of intense and problematic SMU; and (3) whether differences in the country-level prevalence of intense and problematic SMU were related to differences in mobile Internet access. METHODS: Individual-level data came from 154,981 adolescents (meanage = 13.5) from 29 countries that participated in the 2017/2018 Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) survey. Intense SMU was measured by the time spent on social media, whereas problematic SMU was defined by symptoms of addiction to social media. Mental (life satisfaction and psychological complaints), school (school satisfaction and perceived school pressure), and social (family support and friend support) well-being were assessed. Country-level data came from aggregated individual-level data and data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on Internet access. RESULTS: Two-level regression analyses indicated that in countries with a lower prevalence of intense SMU, intense users reported lower levels of life satisfaction and family support and more psychological complaints than nonintense users. In contrast, in countries with a higher prevalence of intense SMU, intense users reported higher levels of family support and life satisfaction than nonintense users, and similar levels of psychological complaints. In all countries, intense users reported more friend support than nonintense users. The findings regarding problematic SMU were more consistent: In all countries, problematic users reported lower well-being on all domains than nonproblematic users. Observed differences in country-level prevalence rates of intense and problematic SMU could not be explained by mobile Internet access. CONCLUSIONS: Adolescents reporting problematic SMU are particularly at risk of lower well-being. In many countries, intense SMU may be a normative adolescent behavior that contributes positively to specific domains of their well-being.

Actical accelerometer sedentary activity thresholds for adults.

BACKGROUND: Actical accelerometer thresholds have been derived to enable objective measurement of time spent performing sedentary activity in children and adolescents, but not adults. Thus, the purpose of this study was to determine Actical accelerometer sedentary activity thresholds for adults. METHODS: Data were available from 3187 participants aged 6 to 79 years from a preliminary partial dataset of the Canadian Health Measures Survey, who wore an Actical for 7 days. Step count data were used to evaluate the use of 50, 100, and 800 counts per min (cpm) as sedentary activity thresholds. Minutes when no steps were recorded were considered minutes of sedentary activity. RESULTS: The use of higher cpm thresholds resulted in a greater percentage of sedentary minutes being correctly classified as sedentary. The percentage of minutes that were incorrectly classified as sedentary was substantially higher when using a threshold of 800 cpm compared with 50 or 100 cpm. Results were similar for children, adolescents, and adults. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that a threshold of 100 cpm is appropriate for classifying sedentary activity of adults when using the Actical. As such, wear periods with minutes registering less than 100 cpm would be classified as time spent performing sedentary activity.