Stress reduction: the potential of social media

Yes, social media can definitely have a positive influence on stress reduction, but in a different way than one might think. Julia Sandach, a graduate of the bachelor's degree program in teaching at vocational colleges with a specialization in health sciences/nursing, investigated the influence of social media role models on the formation of stress-reducing habits in her final thesis. Münster UAS awarded her the university prize for her work.

Positive influence through influencers?

"My favorite subject in college was health psychology," Sandach says. She found stress reduction particularly interesting. The social media aspect was then brought to her by her bachelor's thesis advisor, Dr. Jennifer Schmidt, professor and dean at the Münster Department of Health (MDH). "I hoped to find out what a positive attitude toward social media depends on so that society can benefit more from it," the university award winner explains. Her assumption was that people with high self-efficacy would be positively influenced by influencers* and, conversely, that people with low self-efficacy would be more intimidated by images and videos of particularly successful influencers*. Self-efficacy in social science is the belief in one's own ability to cope with environmental demands or to achieve the desired results through one's own behavior.

When the supposedly perfect social media role model doesn't fit after all

"When I started my bachelor's thesis, I was very optimistic that I would be able to confirm my hypothesis about how social media role models affect their followers in the end," says the 22-year-old. The results of her online survey then surprised her, she says. 121 young adults between the ages of 18 and 29 took part and gave answers about their perception of social media role models, their personal self-efficacy and their meditation and mindfulness behavior. In fact, other aspects mattered: personal attitudes toward social media role models in general, users' media literacy, and a comparable life context. "For example, a supposedly perfect social media role model who lives in Bali and meditates there on the beach every day is much too far removed from one's own life context to be positively influenced - or so most respondents said," explains the UAS alumna.

Particularly important: media competence

Sandach refuted her theses in the paper. The good thing about it: "It turns out that media competence is very important, for example, in order to be able to assess who is credible in the social media. Children should learn media competence at an early age," Sandach is convinced. This is very relevant for teaching, he says, as these competencies can be addressed directly in school - also with regard to the increasing relevance of social media. "Social media offers a wide range of mentors in a wide range of health fields - and you don't have to look very hard for them." Her bachelor's thesis changed her perspective, Sandach says: Social media should not be associated with the term "fake" per se.

"Ms. Sandach chose a bachelor thesis with a very innovative and challenging topic and research design and implemented the work perfectly according to the high standards of scientific work. In her work, she was able to show that even very well-founded research hypotheses cannot always be confirmed by empirical evidence, but that well-done scientific studies nevertheless contribute to gaining knowledge for practice. Here, for example, to the effect that we should not only criticize social media, but also take a close look at their potential and the correspondingly conducive circumstances."

Source: FH Münster