Exploring the Impact of Social Media on Care Experienced Young People's Self-View and Mental Wellbeing: Implications for Social Media Design & Policy

社交媒体是许多人生活中重要的一部分；有些人甚至会说它是不可避免的。根据研究，全球有35亿社交媒体用户(Emarsys，2019年)。针对如今被称为“Z世代”的年轻人，Instagram是使用最多的群体之一，拥有73%的活跃用户，紧随其后的是Snapchat(63%)和YouTube(62%)(市场营销排行榜，2019年)。研究发现，Z世代每天浏览社交媒体网站的时间约为三个小时，比千禧一代的平均时间长约一个小时(世界经济论坛，2019年)。由于年轻人在社交媒体上花费了如此多的时间，研究社交媒体对心理健康(MH)和幸福感的影响是很重要的。目前，关于社交媒体对心理健康影响的结果喜忧参半，而且不一致(Best，Manktelow&Taylor，2014)。通常，这项研究关注的是普通人群，而这项研究的目标是关注一群更容易受到心理健康问题影响的人：被照顾的年轻人。被照顾的儿童和青少年更容易受到心理健康问题的影响(Richardson&Lelliott，2003)，因此探索社交媒体如何影响可能已经容易受到此类问题影响的人群的心理健康是很重要的。本项目关注心理健康的三个具体方面，这三个方面有助于建立自我的心理模型：自尊、自我价值感和认同感。这项研究的目的包括：找出社交媒体对自尊的影响在普通人群和被照顾的青少年(年龄在11-18岁之间)之间是否不同；探索社交媒体如何让被照顾的青少年对他们的自尊、自我价值和身份认同感到满意；确定社交媒体对这些方面的心理健康有利或有害的具体特征；探索青少年对社交媒体现有政策的了解，以及他们认为政府应该考虑的问题；并讨论被照顾的青少年如何能够使用数字手段作为一种自我照顾的方式，通过提高对数字工具的认识，在线工具可以帮助他们以一种有利于他们心理健康的方式浏览社交媒体。因此，个人数据在该项目中的广泛使用与Horizon的“在数据中创造我们的生活”的主题相关，以及它有望在全球范围内产生的影响，为社会护理、社交媒体设计师、政策和心理健康专业人士等几个部门提供指导和见解，可能会使社交媒体成为更容易受到心理健康问题影响的人更安全的地方。由于参与者群体的脆弱性，负责任和合乎道德的研究也将在研究活动的设计和实施中发挥核心作用。这项研究有两个行业合作伙伴：安德鲁和弗吉尼亚陆克文收养和研究实践中心，以及诺丁汉生物医学研究中心。

Social media is a prominent part of many people's lives; some may even say it is unavoidable. According to research, there are 3.5 billion social media users worldwide (Emarsys, 2019). When focusing on the young people of today termed 'Generation Z', Instagram is one of the most used at 73% active users, followed by Snapchat (63%) and YouTube (62%) (Marketing Charts, 2019), and Generation Z have been found to browse social media sites for roughly three hours each day, which is around an hour longer than the average millennial (World Economic Forum, 2019). With young people spending so much time on social media, it is important to research the effects it has on mental health (MH) and wellbeing.Currently, results around social media's influence on mental health are mixed and inconsistent (Best, Manktelow & Taylor, 2014). Typically, this research has focused on the general population, whereas this research aims to focus on a group of people who are more vulnerable to mental health issues: looked after young people. Looked after children and adolescents are more susceptible to mental health issues (Richardson & Lelliott, 2003), so it is important to explore how social media impacts upon the mental health of a population who may already be vulnerable to such issues.This project is focusing on three specific aspects of mental health that contribute to the mental model of the self: self-esteem, self-worth and sense of identity. Aims of the research include: finding out if the effects of social media on self-esteem differ between the general population and looked after adolescents (aged between 11-18 years old); exploring how social media makes looked after adolescents feel about their self-esteem, self-worth and identity; identifying specific features of social media that are beneficial or detrimental to those aspects of mental health; exploring what adolescents know about existing policies around social media and what they think should be considered by the government; and discussing ways in which looked after adolescents may be able to use digital means as a way of self-care, by increasing awareness of digital tools online that could help them navigate social media in a way that is beneficial for their mental health. The rife use of personal data in this project is therefore relevant to Horizon's theme of 'Creating Our Lives in Data', as well as the global impact it will hopefully have on offering guidance and insight to several sectors, such as social care, social media designers, policy and mental health professionals, potentially making social media a safer place for those who may be more vulnerable to mental health issues. Due to the vulnerable nature of the participant group, responsible and ethical research will also play a central part in the design and conduct of the research activities. This research has two industry partners: The Andrew and Virginia Rudd Centre for Adoption and Research Practice, and the Nottingham Biomedical Research Centre.