The Effect of Social Media Usage on Self-Concept and Mental Health of Students Majoring in Education at Tehran Azad Universities

Dehghani, Maryam; Banitaba, Seyed Mostafa

Volume 25, Issue 29 (9-2025) JNIP 2025, 25(29): 1-16 | Back to browse issues page

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Dehghani M, Banitaba S M. The Effect of Social Media Usage on Self-Concept and Mental Health of Students Majoring in Education at Tehran Azad Universities. JNIP 2025; 25 (29) :1-16
URL: http://jnip.ir/article-1-1360-en.html

The Effect of Social Media Usage on Self-Concept and Mental Health of Students Majoring in Education at Tehran Azad Universities

Maryam Dehghani

, Seyed Mostafa Banitaba ^*

Department of science, Nae.C., Islamic Azad University, Naein, Iran

Abstract: (5 Views)

The study was applied in terms of its purpose; quantitative in terms of its data type; descriptive-analytical in terms of its design (nature) with a correlational approach; positivism in terms of its paradigm; and cross-sectional in terms of its data collection time. The statistical population of the study included students majoring in education at Tehran Azad Universities, 291 of whom were selected by calculating the minimum sample size in structural equation modeling and using a random cluster sampling method. The measurement tools in this study were the Goldberg et al. (1972) standard health questionnaire, Rasoulabadi's (2015) social media usage, and Dolatabadi's (2007) self-concept questionnaire. The data analysis method included two parts: statistical description of data to describe demographic characteristics and description of variables, as well as statistical analysis of data to test research hypotheses (Pearson correlation and structural equation modeling) with Spss-V27 and SmartPls-V3.3 software. The results showed that the amount of social media use has a negative and significant effect on students' self-concept and mental health. The path coefficient between the amount of social media use and self-concept is -0.729, which indicates a strong and significant negative relationship; meaning that with increasing use of social media, students' self-concept decreases. Also, the path between the amount of social media use and mental health has a coefficient of -0.762, which indicates that excessive use of social media significantly reduces students' mental health. These findings indicate that dependence on social networks can lead to reduced self-esteem, increased anxiety and depression, and weakened life satisfaction, and highlight the need to design educational and psychological interventions to manage healthy use of social networks.

Keywords: Social Network Usage, Self-Concept, Mental Health

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Type of Study: Research | Subject: Special
Received: 2025/06/24 | Accepted: 2025/08/30 | Published: 2025/09/3