Run Game Practice

Social media and dating: how it affects how you feel about yourself

6 min read

For some people social media lowers how they feel about themselves, and for others it makes little difference. Studies find that patterns of compulsive use go along with more anxiety and low mood, while a large analysis of teens found that technology use explains very little of how well they're doing. Two experiments where people cut back reported improvements in mood or well-being, one of them small. So the practical question is how scrolling affects you, and a week of testing it will tell you more than a headline will.

What the research found

None of these studies is about dating specifically, and all have limits.

Problematic use and distress. A 2022 meta-analysis in JMIR Mental Health (Shannon and colleagues) pooled 18 studies with 9,269 adolescents and young adults. It looked at "problematic" social media use, defined as compulsive, preoccupied use that continues despite negative consequences, not hours spent. It found moderate correlations with depression (r = 0.27), anxiety (r = 0.35) and stress (r = 0.31). The authors note the data were cross-sectional, so causation can't be inferred and it may run both ways. Most studies relied on self-report.

Cutting back, a small experiment. Hunt, Marx, Lipson and Young (2018, Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology) randomly assigned 143 undergraduates to either keep their usual habits or limit Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat to 10 minutes per platform per day for three weeks (after a week of baseline). The limited group reported significant decreases in depression and loneliness, and the effect was strongest in people who were more depressed at the start. The details here come from a ScienceDaily summary of the University of Pennsylvania release, not the paper. The authors say it covered only those three platforms and students, and they didn't intend to suggest quitting altogether.

Cutting back, Facebook only. Allcott, Braghieri, Eichmeyer and Gentzkow (American Economic Review, 2020) randomly assigned US Facebook users to deactivate their accounts for four weeks, with deactivation verified. Only the abstract was read. It reports that deactivation raised subjective well-being, and also reduced news knowledge and political polarization. Facebook is one platform, and it was studied around the 2018 US midterm election.

The other side. Amy Orben and Andrew Przybylski's analysis (Nature Human Behaviour, 2019) used three large datasets with 355,358 participants and found the association between digital technology use and adolescent well-being was negative but small, explaining at most 0.4% of the variation in well-being. Only the abstract was read. The data were correlational and drawn from existing datasets, and it covers teens and all digital technology, not dating or any single app.

Put together: the picture is mixed. Whether and how much social media affects well-being appears to depend on the person and on how they use it, and the strongest links are with compulsive patterns. These studies are of students, teens and users of specific platforms, so they can't tell you what your own feed does to you.

How it can show up in dating

These are common patterns, not findings about everyone.

Stop comparing yourself goes deeper on the comparison habit, and dating burnout covers the tired, cynical version.

A 7-day trim to test it

Treat it as an experiment on yourself. A common approach is to change one thing at a time and watch your mood.

Day 1: baseline. Check your phone's screen-time report for the last week. Note how you feel after you close each app, in one word: fine, flat, worse, wired. Do this for a day without changing anything.

Days 2 to 3: set a cap. Pick a daily limit for the app that leaves you feeling the worst. Ten to 15 minutes per app is a reasonable starting point (the Hunt study used 10 per platform, and it was one small study of students). Use the phone's own timer. Move the apps off your home screen.

Days 4 to 5: change the feed. Unfollow or mute accounts that reliably make you feel behind. They aren't doing anything wrong. They're just not useful to you right now. Follow things that give you a concrete next step: a hobby, a local event, a creator who teaches a skill.

Days 6 to 7: no scrolling in two windows. The first 30 minutes after waking and the last 30 before sleep. Use an alarm clock, not the phone, if you need one.

Then review. Compare your day-1 words to your day-7 words. If you feel better, keep what helped. If you feel the same, you've learned this isn't your main lever and you can put the effort elsewhere. If you felt worse, for example more anxious or isolated, stop the cap and keep what works. This isn't a test you can fail.

Feeds that help and feeds that hurt

A rule of thumb: ask what you do after you've looked. If it makes you want to do something (go to a class, send a message, try a recipe), it's useful. If it makes you want to scroll more or feel flat, it's a candidate to trim.

Tends to help Tends to hurt
Friends and people you know Strangers' highlight reels
Skills, hobbies, local events Rankings and "value" content
Specific, practical advice Content that makes you anxious about status
Things you'll act on this week Endless scrolling with no end point

This is a personal judgment, and the same account can sit in either column for different people.

If it's more than a habit

If low mood, anxiety or difficulty cutting back lasts more than two weeks, or it's affecting sleep, work or relationships, the NHS suggests seeing a GP. In the US, a primary care doctor or a therapist is a good place to start. Should you delete dating apps helps if the apps themselves are the issue.

What to do next

  1. Check last week's screen-time report and write down your top two apps.
  2. Pick one daily cap (10 to 15 minutes) for the app you feel worst after, and set the timer today.
  3. Mute or unfollow five accounts that reliably make you feel behind, and follow two that give you a concrete next step.
  4. Keep a one-word log after each session for seven days.
  5. On day 7, compare the words and decide what to keep.

If you want a measure that belongs to you, Run Game tracks your own totals, streaks and success rate in Stats, so you can compare yourself to your own past instead of to strangers.

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