I Can't Understand You, Because I Can't Understand Myself: The Interplay between Alexithymia, Excessive Social Media Use, Empathy, and Theory of Mind

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F61989592%3A15260%2F23%3A73622860" target="_blank" >RIV/61989592:15260/23:73622860 - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/448980" target="_blank" >https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/448980</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.31820/pt.32.3.8" target="_blank" >10.31820/pt.32.3.8</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

I Can't Understand You, Because I Can't Understand Myself: The Interplay between Alexithymia, Excessive Social Media Use, Empathy, and Theory of Mind

Original language description

Social media represent a relatively new phenomenon affecting the lives of people across the globe. Recently, the number of social media users reached billions, and this number increases every year. Previous studies indicated that excessive social media use may have adverse effects on mental and physical health. Therefore, it is important to explore what psychological factors may contribute to the excessive use of social media. It was found that social anxiety and alexithymia are robust predictors of excessive social media use. However, little is known about the role of empathy and Theory of Mind (ToM) in excessive social media use. Therefore, the primary aim of this study was to examine the mediating effect of empathy and ToM in the relationship between alexithymia and social anxiety. Collectively, 1737 subjects participated in the study (M-age = 25.28, SDage = 10, Females: 60.83%). We assessed empathy, social anxiety, ToM, loneliness, and excessive social media use. Structural Equation Modelling was used to test the mediating effect of empathy and ToM. It was revealed that there is a positive relationship between difficulty in identifying feelings (alexithymia) and social anxiety: B = 0.53 (95% CI [0.41 - 0.65], p &lt; .001). Moreover, a significant positive association was found between social anxiety and excessive social media use: B = 0.28, 95% CI [0.14 - 0.37], p &lt; 0.001. However, loneliness was unrelated to social media use. Similarly, there was no significant mediating effect of empathy and ToM on the link between difficulty in identifying feelings and social anxiety. Future research should examine the generalizability of our findings using different cultural/linguistic environments. The primary limitation of the study is the use of cross-sectional data which prevent to draw causal links between the explored relationships.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_SC - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the SCOPUS database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

50101 - Psychology (including human - machine relations)

Project

—

Continuities

S - Specificky vyzkum na vysokych skolach

Publication year

2023

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Psihologijske Teme

ISSN

1332-0742

e-ISSN

1849-0395

Volume of the periodical

32

Issue of the periodical within the volume

3

Country of publishing house

HR - CROATIA

Number of pages

21

Pages from-to

555-575

UT code for WoS article

001140161200009

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-85179307809