Abstract:

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between social media dependence and mental disorders. For this purpose, standard and stepwise regression tests were used to test whether social media dependence was associated with somatization, phobic anxiety, depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, paranoid ideation, psychotic sleep and eating disorders and anger- analyzed. 583 adolescents participated in the study. Social Media Dependency Scale and SCL-90 Symptom Screening Test were used in the study. As a result of research, mental disorders predict social media dependence. Variables that have the highest correlation with social media dependency were found to be psychotism, paranoid thoughts, phobic anxiety and anger-hostility feelings with the duration of social media daily use. According to the data obtained, the most effective variable on the social media dependency is the daily usage time of the social media. There is a positive and high relationship between social media dependence and the duration of daily social media use. Having certain mental disorders of the adolecents is effective in increasing social media dependency. Mental disorders may also affect the increase in the number of hours spent on social media

Keywords: