Can Social Media Usage Affect Memory?
Does more social media use mean you won’t be able to remember your passwords?
Our memories are a vital part of everyday life—it would be a lot harder to get through the day if we couldn’t remember where we left our keys or our coworkers’ names.
Well, the ever-growing presence of the internet in our lives is changing how we process and remember information. Since everything we’d ever want to know is available with a simple Google search, our brains are no longer so required to retain knowledge.
Changes in memory due to increasing internet use are being studied, and one group of researchers narrowed down their study to social media use. More specifically, the potential mediating effects of problematic social media use.
What is Memory?
Your memory is basically the filing system of the brain. It saves the information for later and lets you access it when you need it. Memory can be divided into three types that all work together:
Sensory memory allows us to remember sensory data even after the stimulus is gone—like smells and sounds.
Short-term memory, as the name suggests, only holds information for a few seconds.
Long-term memory stores memory for long periods of time.
Man with papers swirling around him
This is how your memory functions when it’s in perfect working order—when your brain is fed, rested, calm, and firing on all cylinders.
What Affects Our Memories?
Now think about when you’re feeling tired or stressed. Do you function as well? Can you recall where you left your keys nearly as quickly? When your brain isn’t operating at its full capacity, your memory is affected.
Researchers have determined two factors that can make it harder for our memories to work well:
Organic illnesses like tumours, molecular abnormalities, neuronal damage, and diseases like Alzheimers and Dementia.
Psyche-related disorders like mental and emotional conditions, such as when things like anxiety, depression, insomnia, and stress enter the conversation. These are some of the most common negative effects of social media use.
Memory is an internal process, but it can be measured by the memory performance scale of the memory awareness rating scale (MARS-MPS). This test presents tasks to the participants and assesses their memory function, including remembering people’s names, recognizing familiar objects, and remembering a short route.
What is Problematic Social Media Use?
Social media can be our friend—connecting people, sharing information, generating laughter. So when does it cross over to the other side and become a problem? Well, this can look like many different things for different people, but the most common concerns are:
Social media addiction: a behavioural addiction characterized by being overly concerned by social media, feeling uncontrollable urges to log on, and spending too much time online.
Passive social media use: where the user spends their time scrolling and observing instead of being an active participant. This type of use leaves users more open to feelings like FOMO, anxiety, depression, etc.
For the purposes of the study, the researchers used the social media use disorder scale (SMUD), a 27-item scale that measures the degree of problematic social media use in the participants. The higher the score, the more problematic the use.
Can Problematic Social Media Use Affect Your Memory?
Participants with the highest negative social media use scores had the worst memory performance. The semantic memory—the memory of facts and common knowledge not gained by personal experiences—was most affected.
Interestingly, the researchers found that depression, insomnia, and stress were not mediating factors between problematic social media use and memory performance. Basically, they didn’t make the participants’ memories worse.
Person kicking a large phone
The one factor that did make a difference was anxiety. Those who were experiencing anxiety from negative social media use also suffered from poorer memory performance.
We need our memories in order to succeed in our careers and academics… and just to get through everyday life. Memory is an invaluable tool, and healthier social media use is a small price to pay. So, if you think you might be online a little too much, set some boundaries and get that screen time down! Your relaxed, ever-more functional brain will thank you!
Study Objectives & Methods
Association between problematic social media use and memory performance in a sample of Lebanese adults: the mediating effect of anxiety, depression, stress and insomnia
Maya Dagher, M.D.; Youssef Farchakh, M.D.; Sam Barbar, M.D.; Chadia Haddad, PhD; Marwan Akel, PhD; Souheil Hallit, PhD; Sahar Obeid, PhD
Published in Head and Face Medicine in 2011.
This group of researchers decided to look into the mediating effects of anxiety, depression, insomnia, and stress on social media users’ memories. A sample of 466 people answered a questionnaire in person. The researchers used validated scales to measure each factor: memory, stress, problematic social media use, anxiety, depression, and insomnia. This study focused on depression, anxiety, stress, and insomnia, all measured using validated scales in the questionnaire. Anxietywas measured using the Hamilton anxiety scale (HAM-A). Depression was measured with the Hamilton depression rating scale (HDRS). Stress was measured using the Beirut distress scale (BDS-10). Insomnia was assessed using the Lebanese insomnia scale (LIS-18). With information from each of these scales, the researchers were able to determine which factors had a negative impact on memory performance.
