THE ROLE OF EMOTIONAL INVESTMENT BETWEEN SOCIAL MEDIA USAGE AND LIFE SATISFACTION

Abstract

The consumption of social media has grown ingrained in the lives of today's youth. The present study examined four possible explanations with various factors for the mixed findings on the association between social media use and well-being. A serial mediation models were proposed to examine the relationship between social media usage and life satisfaction through Emotional Investment (EI). The correlational and mediation method was adopted on data received from 660 Indian participants. The results revealed that the most critical factors influencing life satisfaction were passive social media usage as compared to the total time spent on social media (TTSSM), and active and active non-social usage (ANSU). Additionally, the present study revealed that EI is the root cause of poor life satisfaction. The present study's findings are strong enough to encourage parents, educators, and health professionals to counsel young people about their EI in social media.