Social Media Dependency and Facebook Usage among the Older Adults of Kerala

Title

Social Media Dependency and Facebook Usage among the Older Adults of Kerala

Creator

Menon V.A.; Prasad A.; Puthur L.A.; Soman K.K.; Joseph L.

Description

Social media has become an integral part of modern society, with people of all ages using various platforms to connect, share information, and stay up-to-date on current events. However, there has been a recent trend of increased Facebook usage among older adults, which has raised concerns about social media dependency. The current study explores the trends in social media dependency and Facebook intensity among older adults of Kerala. The present study employed a quantitative research design and the sample consisted of 416 older adults, aged above 60 years. Two scales were used to collect data: the Social Media Dependency Scale (SMDS) and the Facebook Intensity Measure (FBI). Frequency and percentage analysis, Spearman's Rho, Kruskal-Wallis H test, and Mann-Whitney U test were carried out using SPSS (Version 23) for deriving results. Those individuals who are more dependent on social media are also more likely to engage in high levels of Facebook activity. A good majority of the participants were found to be using social media and Facebook for more than 3 hours in a day and having more than 400 friends. Social media dependency and Facebook intensity were reported to be high in urban localities, South Kerala having significantly higher rates of social media dependency when compared to North and Central regions. Social media dependency was found to be high among males, whereas no difference was in Facebook intensity among male and females. Implications: Given the importance of social connections for the well-being of older adults, it is critical to understand the impact of social media use on their lives and develop strategies to promote healthy social media behaviour. 2023 Redfame Publishing Inc.. All Rights Reserved.

Source

Studies in Media and Communication, Vol-11, No. 4, pp. 202-208.

Date

2023-01-01

Publisher

Redfame Publishing Inc.

Subject

Facebook intensity; older adults; social media dependency; well-being

Coverage

Menon V.A., Department of Media Studies, Kristu Jayanti College (Autonomous), Bangalore, 560067, India; Prasad A., Niyama Digital Healthcare Private Limited, Chennai, India; Puthur L.A., Department of Media Studies, Christ (Deemed to be University), Bengaluru, 560029, India; Soman K.K., Department of Education, School of Education & Training, Central University of Tamil Nadu, Tamil Nadu, Thiruvarur, 610005, India; Joseph L., Department of Commerce, St Joseph University, Bengaluru, 560027, India

Rights

All Open Access; Gold Open Access

Relation

ISSN: 23258071

Format

Online

Language

English

Type

Article

Identifier

https://doi.org/10.11114/smc.v11i4.6060

https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85162086575&doi=10.11114%2fsmc.v11i4.6060&partnerID=40&md5=87b3809afaadc66cb1461d20b70fc045