Social Media and Loneliness

Particularly to the younger Millennials and Generation Z, it appears as if social networking sites (SNS) is coming to the point of replacing normal social interactions and removing much of the personal aspects out of socialization. With the Internet literally being able to move at the speed of light, face-to-face interactions appear to be slowly in decline. As a highly social species, humans require interaction to maintain a healthy psychological state. This research has been conducted to analyze the level of loneliness and the level of SNS use with the intent of reinvestigating previous research on the correlations of SNS and loneliness with a more diverse demographic sample. In addition, this study has been designed to see if high usage of specific platforms has an increased likelihood to be related with loneliness. This research has been conducted by means of an anonymous survey of college students at a university in the Pacific to determine the amount of time spent on SNS, activities conducted while utilizing SNS, the priorities placed, and other information in regards to SNS usage. Inquiry was also conducted in analyzing how interpersonal relationships are related to or affected by SNS. This has been combined with the revised UCLA loneliness scale to determine if there is a correlation between SNS use, specific platform use, and loneliness. While previous similar studies have been conducted, the two primary differences are the diversity in the demographics available to be surveyed and the attempt at identifying if a specific platform is more likely to be related with loneliness.