Does the Number of Likes Affect Adolescents’ Emotions? The Moderating Role of Social Comparison and Feedback-Seeking on Instagram

Abstract

Instagram is a social networking site (SNS) that facilitate the social-comparison and feedback-seeking (SCFS) processes, which are particularly relevant during adolescence. Likes represent numeric evaluative feedback and seem to be considered as a form of social reward. In this research we examine some psychosocial factors that could influence the Instagram usage intensity (i.e. SCFS and motivations) and analyze the moderating role of SCFS in the relationship between the number of likes on posts and adolescents’ emotions. The sample consisted of 182 adolescent students aged between 13 and 18 years (M = 15.35 years, SD = 1.11). The results show that the social interaction, storage, and gossip motivations mediate the relationship between SCFS and Instagram usage intensity, and that the influence of the number of likes on emotions depended on the degree of SCFS. The discussion of the findings emphasizes that likes have a special social and affective relevance for adolescents with high SCFS, who might become more emotionally susceptible to the feedback they received from their audience on Instagram. This research could be a precedent to future research and the development of intervention programs based on the responsible use of SNSs in an educative context.

Keywords:

• Social network sites
• adolescence
• social comparison
• feedback-seeking
• emotional state

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank high schools for their collaboration.

Disclosure Statement

The authors declares that there is no conflict of interest.

Notes

1 In our research, we have based on the classification of adolescence the World Health Organization carried out that divided the adolescent period in early adolescence, which ranged from 10 to 15 years, and in middle and late adolescence, which ranged from 15 to 19 years.

2 Low and high values for SCFS are plotted at 1 SD below and above the mean, respectively.

3 Regarding control variables, as indicated above after we performed t tests, women scored higher than men on the motivations of social interaction, evasion, and gossip. Similarly, the participants’ gender affected their Instagram usage intensity, with women showing higher levels of Instagram usage than men.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the “New Forms of Gender Violence: Risk and Protective Factors to Psychosocial Wellbeing” R & D project (PSI2017-84703-R), and the “Gender Violence in the Digital Age: Do New Communication and Information Technologies (TIC) Empower or Subdivide Women?” project (B-SEJ-472-UGR18), as well as by a Grant from the FPU Program of the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities given to the first author (FPU18/117409618).

Notes on contributors

M. Dolores Sánchez-Hernández

M. Dolores Sánchez-Hernández is a graduate in Psychology and Master’s Degree in Psychology of Social Intervention from the University of Granada (UGR). She is currently a Doctoral Student in Social Psychology at the UGR, a member of the "Discrimination and stigma: psychosocial aspects" research group, and a member of the “Gender Violence, Intervention, and Counseling (VIGIA)” association. Her research interests address gender violence, cyberdating abuse, social perception, and well-being.

M. Carmen Herrera

M. Carmen Herrera is an Associate Professor of Social Psychology at the UGR, PhD in Social Psychology, and Expert in Criminology. She is also a member of the "Discrimination and stigma: psychosocial aspects" research group and a member of the VIGIA association. Her research interests address gender violence, sexism, sexual harassment, social perception, SNSs usage, and cyberviolence.

Francisca Expósito

Francisca Expósito is a Professor of Social Psychology at the UGR. She has developed her research work on discrimination, sexism, and gender violence, and has carried out social intervention programmes in the field of law and gender violence. She is also the founder of the VIGIA association and creator of the “Psychosocial Intervention for minors (and their mothers) victims of Gender Violence” UGR Program.