社交媒体上瘾会导致抑郁症！

一项新研究表明，使用社交媒体和抑郁之间存在关联，但导致抑郁的原因可能并非单纯的使用，而是过分沉迷社交媒体。

该研究报告的作者之一、匹兹堡大学医学院统计专家埃瑞尔•申萨在发送给路透健康频道的电子邮件中说：“我们相信，至少应该让临床医生知道二者之间的联系，可能会帮助他们诊治抑郁症病人。举例来说，医生也许想了解使用社交媒体的模式，进而判断这些模式是否属于适应不良。”

申萨和她的团队随机挑选了1763名年龄在19-32岁的病人，询问了他们的抑郁症状、社交媒体使用情况和上瘾行为。

衡量社交媒体使用情况的标准是浏览11个热门社交媒体网站的次数和时长，这些网站包括Facebook、推特、Google+、YouTube、领英、Instagram、Pinterest、Tumblr、Vine、Snapchat和Reddit。

为评估沉迷社交媒体的程度，研究人员调整了一项名为卑尔根Facebook上瘾程度的调查，主要考察成瘾行为，比如情绪变化、戒除和复发。

今年3月30日在华盛顿召开的美国行为医学学会年会上，研究人员在报告中指出，除正常工作之外，一半的受访者每天至少在社交媒体上花费一小时，每周浏览社交媒体网站30次。

按照研究人员采用的狭义成瘾标准计算，14%的受访者存在上瘾症状；如果按照广义成瘾标准，这个数字为44%。

一如预期，使用社交媒体越频繁，沉迷程度越高。但仔细研究沉迷程度之后发现，使用社交媒体和抑郁之间联系并不显著。

看起来，对社交媒体上瘾和抑郁的关系更大。研究人员发现，要了解社交媒体究竟如何导致抑郁，上瘾在所有因素中占约四分之三。

弗吉尼亚州诺福克市的琳赛•霍华德是弗吉尼亚临床心理学大学联盟项目负责人之一，她没有参加上述研究。霍华德说：“说到底，造成适应不良的看来是使用社交媒体的方式，而非使用频率。”

霍华德在研究中发现了类似现象，也在本次行为医学学会年会上做了介绍。她的团队发现，通过社交媒体来寻找慰藉的行为可能和对身材较为不满以及饮食不规律有关，但使用社交媒体的频率和这些抑郁症状无关。

霍华德说：“医生应该告诉病人，使用社交媒体的跟抑郁等不良症状可能存在怎样的联系。或许还可以推荐病人使用Freedom等软件限制使用频率，并培养在固定时间上社交媒体的习惯。”（财富中文网）

译者：Charlie

审校：夏林

Studies have linked the use of social media to depression, but addiction to social media, rather than use alone, may explain the connection, new research suggests.

“We believe that at least having clinicians be aware of these associations may be valuable to them as they treat patients with depressive disorders. For example, they may wish to inquire about social media use patterns and determine if those patterns are maladaptive,” coauthor Ariel Shensa of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine told Reuters Health by email.

Shensa and her team randomly selected 1,763 participants, ages 19-32, and asked them about their depressive symptoms, social media use and addictive behaviors.

Social media use was measured by the number of visits and amount of time spent on 11 popular social media sites: Facebook, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr, Vine, Snapchat and Reddit.

To assess addiction to social media, the researchers modified a survey called the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale, looking at addictive behaviors such as mood modification, withdrawal and relapse.

In a presentation March 30 at the annual meeting of the Society of Behavioral Medicine in Washington, DC, the researchers reported that half the participants spent at least an hour a day on non-work related social media use and made 30 site visits per week.

Depending on whether the researchers used narrow or broad criteria for addiction, 14 to 44 percent of participants had scores that suggested a problem.

As expected, high social media usage was linked to higher addiction scores. But after taking addiction scores into consideration, social media use and depression were not significantly linked.

Addiction and depression did appear to be linked, however. Addiction seemed to explain roughly three-quarters of the effect of social media use on depression, the researchers found.

“Ultimately, it appears that the way social media is used, rather than the amount social media is used, leads to maladaptive outcomes,” says Lindsay Howard of the Virginia Consortium Program in Clinical Psychology in Norfolk, who was not involved in the study.

Howard found similarities in the study with her own research, which she also presented at the conference. Her team found that the act of seeking reassurance through social media may be related to higher degrees of dissatisfaction with one’s body and eating disorders, but the frequency of social media use was not tied to those depressive symptoms.

“Physicians should educate their patients regarding how social media use may be related to depression and other negative outcomes,” Howard said. “They might also recommend the use of applications such as ‘Freedom’ that allow patients to limit how often and when they use social media.” Howard says.