You might be familiar with the experience of looking through your Facebook, only to feel like everyone else's life is better than yours.
But such "social comparisons" may be connected with a higher likelihood of having depression. That's one finding from a new study that proved social media behavior has a connection with the mental(精神的)health condition.
In the study, the researchers studies information from around 500 undergraduate students who actively used Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Snapchat and completed an online survey to examine certain social media behavior, as well as symptoms (症状)of depression.
The researchers found that people's reasons for using social media -whether it was out of boredom, or for entertainment or news -were not connected with depression. But how they were using social media was, indeed, connected to the condition.
The finding that people with depression were less likely to post photos of themselves with others may be related to the tendency (倾向)for people with depression to isolate themselves, said Anthony Bobinson, a psychology student at Texas State University.
In any case, it's not good to compare yourself to others who seem "better off" than you, Bobinson added. "People want to make themselves look better off than they really are on social media" He said. "This is not someone's 'real life. It's important to recognize that. "
The researchers also stressed that their findings didn't mean that social media use is necessarily a bad thing.
"I don't think it's always bad," Howard, one of the researchers, said. "It can be bad, but it can also provide social support. It can give people a way to be around people that are similar to them." Finally，Howard hopes the study leads to ideas that may teach people how to use technology better rather than taking it away.
