Social media has become a part of our daily lives. It’s so easy to mindlessly scroll when you’re bored. Think about how many times you open your phone every day and open up TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, or any other social media app. It’s easy to spend hours a day on social media without even realizing it. While there are some positive aspects to social media, like learning new ideas, meeting new people, and staying connected to friends and family, there are also negative effects to using these platforms.
Social media can force us to confront our insecurities head-on. An unflattering photo of yourself posted online might lead you to feel afraid that others will see you as undesirable in real life. A negative comment may cause stress and make you feel insecure about your own self-worth. Seeing people living the life you want to live may make you feel like you will never achieve your goals. The variety of pressures associated with social media are numerous and quite complex.
So if you’re asking yourself the question, “can social media cause anxiety?” Then the short answer is a resounding yes. Many people find themselves experiencing anxiety because of time spent on social media. However, you don’t have to avoid social media entirely, there are healthy ways to manage anxiety and stay connected online. In this article, I’ll cover more reasons why social media can cause anxiety, how to notice the signals, and how to manage your anxiety.
Why Can Social Media Cause Anxiety?
There are many reasons why social media can cause anxiety. One of the biggest issues with social media is that it’s a curated highlight reel of everyone else’s lives. We see people seemingly living their best lives online and we compare our everyday life to it. This can quickly cause feelings of inadequacy and anxiety and lead to negative thoughts. Think about your own experience, have you ever gone on social media and then started thinking, “why can’t I …”
- be as pretty
- be in shape like them
- have a nice house
- have as many followers
- go on a nice vacation
- work for myself
- and the list goes on
When this happens, it can be really hard to remember that you’re looking at a distorted view of reality, in which it seems that everyone else is living the perfect life. So, you’re anxious about not living a life that doesn’t truly exist, because no one’s life is perfect. Yet, when we see these unobtainable standards, our brains convince us that our life should be the same.
Another reason social media causes anxiety is the experience of collective trauma. You may know this by another term called doomscrolling. When something bad happens in the world, and let’s be honest there’s always something bad happening in the world, our social media feeds get flooded with content about it. Repeatedly consuming traumatic content can make you feel helpless, anxious, and leave you with a feeling of existential dread. When this happens, it can be hard to balance your desire to stay informed, with your need to manage your own anxiety. If you’re experiencing this problem, I highly recommend reading my post, “Don’t Let Existential Dread Set In.” It will teach you how to cope with existential dread while staying informed.
Finally, social media can cause anxiety because it’s addicting. Social apps are like casinos, they are designed to keep you engaged, so you are constantly checking for new likes and comments. Then when you don’t get them, you have anxiety about why and you feel bad about yourself.
The addictive nature of social media can also disconnect you from living your own life. You may find yourself scrolling for hours or coming back to the app several times a day without even realizing it. There have been so many times when I planned to go do something only to find myself still staring at my screen two hours later. Then I have anxiety about wasting my time off. Or I get mad at my wife for having her head down on her phone, and then I’m anxious about our relationship because she would rather be on her phone than talk to me. She probably feels the same way about me.
Have any of these scenarios ever happened to you? If you answer yes then you now understand why social media can cause anxiety.
How to Tell If Social Media Is Giving You Anxiety
Now that you know why social media can cause anxiety, it should be easy to spot when it’s giving you anxiety right? Wrong.
Social media anxiety can be difficult to pinpoint at first. It can happen quickly, and you might not even notice it’s happening. Whether you have a diagnosed anxiety disorder or not, social media can have an impact on your mental health, especially if you use it too much. If you’re asking, “am I suffering from social media anxiety?” watch out for these signs:
- You spend too much time on social media and you’re not connecting with the present moments of your own life.
- You feel anxious when you don’t have access to social media.
- You feel a strong urge to check social media, even when you know you don’t have time for it.
- You check social media way too often.
- You feel like social media is controlling your life, or you feel addicted to it.
- You feel depressed or anxious when you see other people’s posts.
- You compare yourself to other people on social media and feel inadequate.
- You feel like you can’t go more than a few minutes without your phone.
- You’re spending more time on social media than you are with friends and family in real life.
- People in your life make comments about how much time you spend on your phone.
How to Deal With Anxiety From Social Media
There are many ways to deal with anxiety from social media. Here are a few strategies you can try.
1. Observe the anxiety.
Before you can calm an anxious feeling you should try to make space for it. When anxiety creeps up, it’s easy to focus on getting rid of it, but when this happens, negative feelings often intensify, and anxiety increases. Instead, try to observe it by noticing how it feels physically. How does it show up in your body? What kind of emotions does it bring up? Try to create a clear picture of what the anxiety feels like so you can better understand it.
2. Unhook from anxious thoughts.
If social media is causing you to have negative thoughts, then you’re probably getting hooked by them. In other words, you’re caught up in these anxious thoughts and you believe them. The good news is there are ways you can unhook from those thoughts. This process is called cognitive defusion. Consider the following example of how it can work.
If you’re scrolling on social media and thinking to yourself, “No one will ever love me because I’m not as attractive as everyone else,” instead, tell yourself “I’m having the thought no one will ever love me.” Notice the separation from the thought. It’s not that the thought goes away, but you acknowledge it as a thought (not a fact), and it loses power over you. Learning this changed my relationship with overthinking and anxiety.
3. Take a break from social media and connect to the present.
Sometimes managing anxiety around social media can be as simple as taking a break. Delete your apps or log out of them. Then commit to connecting to the present world around you by going for a walk, calling a friend, meditating, or exercising. Spending time connecting to the small moments of our everyday lives can do wonders to ease anxiety. In fact, I believe this is the secret to a happy life, and I wrote about it in my post, “How to Enjoy Life’s Little Moments.”
4. Set limits on your social media use.
Once you’ve recognized that social media is causing you anxiety, you can set limits on how often you use it. For example, you can limit the amount of time you spend on social media during a day or week. For detailed instructions on how to limit social media use on an iPhone or iPad, consider this article from OSX Daily. Or, if you have an Android phone go here.
5. Go outside.
Not only can social media cause anxiety, but just spending too much time looking at a screen can leave you feeling irritable. Humans were not meant to be cooped up in front of a phone or computer all day. Spend some time in nature. Go for a picnic, take a hike, go on a scenic drive, or visit an arboretum. According to Harvard Health, spending just 20 minutes in nature can lower stress hormones.
No matter what causes your anxiety, there are many things you can do to ease it. Hopefully, the five strategies I offered will help get you started, and if you want more, read my article, “14 Ways to Ease Anxiety When You’re Overwhelmed.”
How to Avoid Social Media Anxiety
Sometimes one of the best strategies for social media anxiety is avoidance. Here are some different ways you can avoid social media anxiety.
1. Go on a social media cleanse.
If you feel like social media is causing you anxiety, you can participate in a social media cleanse. During this cleanse, you’re completely abstaining from social media. I recommend doing this over the course of a weekend and locking your devices in a timed lockbox. I explain this process in my article “Burnout First Aid: How to Find Immediate Stress Relief.”
2. Delete your apps.
This is the simplest way to avoid social media. If you don’t have the apps on your phone, you can’t access them. Remember, it’s easy to install the apps again when you feel ready.
3. Log out.
Log out of social media accounts when you’re not using them. Social media is a social experience, meaning that you have to be logged in to see anything. If you log out when you’re not using the account, you’ll be less tempted to open it.
4. Keep your phone out of reach.
If you find yourself constantly checking your social media accounts, stop making them so accessible. Instead of keeping your phone at arm’s length all the time, consider placing it far enough away that you have to get up to look at it. This is sure to reduce the amount of time you spend looking at social media.
5. Abstain from social media for a period of time.
Sometimes, a cleanse, daily limits, or some of the other strategies I’ve outlined are not enough. If you find your anxiety is really high because of how much time you’re spending on social media then you may need to abstain for a period of time. When I wanted to cut back on drinking alcohol, I took part in Dry January, a whole month alcohol-free. The benefits were amazing, and I drank less throughout the year because of it. Perhaps you need to do the same with social media. A month away could be enough to change your relationship with it.
Learn to Manage Your Relationship With Social Media
The next time you find yourself wondering, “can social media cause anxiety?” remember that you have the tools to manage your relationship with social. You have already taken the first step by reading this article. Moving forward, keep these tips in mind so that you can stay present and happy in your own life. Additionally, for a deeper dive on anxiety, check out — The Ultimate Guide to Anxiety: A Deep Dive from Someone Who’s Been There
There’s nothing wrong with using social media, but you have to make your own mental health a priority. You’re on the right path now, and you don’t have to let social media control you.
