The use of social media may have a dramatic effect on the sleep habits. During the last years, there has been observed a dramatic increase in the application of social media at bedtime.
It resulted in the increase of the waking times, inability to maintain sleep, awakening too early, and promotion of general sleep disruptions. The analysis of the journal articles is aimed at gaining the objective understanding of the effects, which social media produces on the sleeping habits.In the article “The Association between Social Media Use and Sleep Disturbances among Young Adults” Levenson et al (2016) try to find out the existing association between the application of social media and sleep disturbances.
In the course of research, the authors applied the nationally representative sample of 1796, U.S. adults aged from 19 to 32 years old, selected randomly and analyzed the longitudinal survey, which evaluated the health behaviors. Results manifested that 29,5% of individuals experienced strong sleep disturbances after the use of social media, 28,0% had medium sleep disturbances, while 42,6% exhibited low sleep disturbance. Authors stated that the work proves that social media negatively affects the sleep patterns and has essential clinical implications on the well-being of a person.
The work is significant for the investigation of the theme under analysis, as it demonstrates the correlation between the sleep disturbance and social media use.Another article “Social Media Use, Social Media Stress, and Sleep: Examining Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Relationships in Adolescents”, dedicated to this topic is written by Schuur, Baumgartner and Sumter (2018). It researches how the stress, caused by the prolonged application of social media, affects the quality of sleep. The study applied the three-wave longitudinal study among the adolescents in seven secondary schools. The special scale was developed in order to measure the SM stress. The results manifested that application of social media promotes the daytime sleepiness and sleep latency. Moreover, it manifested that social media stress was a stronger predictor of negative sleeping patterns among the adolescents. The conclusion notes that the study exhibits that social media use has a lower effect on boys’ sleep habits and that there exists a positive connection between the application of social media and increased stress level, which resulted in insomnia.
The article is vital, as it provides the deep, grounded and thorough observation of the link, existing between the negative sleep patterns and increased use of social media.
