PL2S139 Advanced Research Using Statistics in Psychology Assignment Sample

A. Introduction - PL2S139 Advanced Research Using Statistics in Psychology

Social media is a method of communication with people, which involves sharing their thoughtful information through online or digital platforms. In modern times, social media has become an influential part of people's lives. Social media significantly controls the communication, relationships, and experiences of people. Multiple social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok have gained millions of users on a daily basis. With this many users connected with those social media platforms, their influence increases far beyond the purpose of entertainment (Cao et al., 2021). Their presence and contents significantly affect the person’s personal identity and mental well-being. In this process, the most drastic effect of using social media is on self-esteem. Self-esteem refers to the level of confidence that a person has in his own ability, worthiness, and morals. This aspect is based on their own opinions and benefits about themselves. Self-esteem is a critical component of mental health and well-being that reflects an individual’s overall sense of self-worth. By considering a specific view of people which states that social media influences the construction of community and boosts self-confidence along with self-expression and positive feedback, others highlight its potentially negative effects, such as unhealthy and distrustful comparisons, promoting unrealistic standards, and increasing self-feelings of inadequacy (Zhang et al. 2022).

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The relationship between social media and self-esteem is very complex and is typically influenced by various factors such as the activation time and the frequency of the use of social media. The characteristic of the individual is also making high importance in this matter. Apart from that the lowest influential factor affecting self-esteem was the nature of online interaction. For example, passive consumption of social media content can lead to creating and booting the characteristic of envy and reduce self-worthiness. On the other hand, a constant active connection with social media can a sense of belonging and accomplishment (Verneert et al., 2021). For the most part, the negative content and the unrealized portrayals that people present on social media can create unrealistic benchmarks that social media users use to compare their lifestyles unfavorably with others. Many people post their rich lives on social media platforms which can make others' lives feel inadequate (Leban et al., 2021). The previous research shows taught this comparison is one of the main reasons for lowering the self-esteem of people special among teenagers who are suffering from peer pressure. Additionally, the social influence of its connected people is highly reliant on the likes and comments for the validation of the life decisions. This can negatively affect the view of people themselves. The positive side of social media is that it can significantly boost a person self–esteem by giving them the opportunity to connect with beloved people and additional social support (Zhang et al., 2023).

The conducted study aimed to explore both the negative and positive side connections between social media usage and self-esteem. The main aspect of the research is to understand the influence of social media platforms on individual well-being. By conducting a correlation research study, the resort is going to understand the qualitative relationship between social media and self-esteem. The findings are aimed at delivering the psychological implications of social media usage, by evaluating the significant amount of information through the help of analysis tools.

B. Methodology

The methodology section is used to describe the overall procedure that is going to be applied in conjuring the studies and identifying the relationship between social media usage and self-esteem. In this process, a correlative qualitative study was conducted to identify the relation between those two variables. SPSS, a specified analytics tool, has been used to determine the significance of the variables which are social media and self-esteem.

B.1: Participants

A qualitative voluntary sampling method is to gather related information on the relationship between social media and self-esteem. The process specifically includes a group of people who are willing to participate in the research to fulfill the purpose of the study. Voluntary sampling is specifically chosen for the research because it can give diverse results of the sampling process. Through this process, the divorce chrome related to aspects such as the influence of demographics and time consumption on social media can be achieved which is not limited to any age gap or lifestyle bases. However, the voluntary sampling process also has some drawbacks. There is a slight chance of developing biased results because the characteristics of the volunteers may differ from the people who do not want to volunteer. In this process, the validity of the results given by the volunteers cannot be verified and the method also was not representative.

B.2: Materials

A detailed questionnaire related to the research was developed using the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (ref). The main reasons behind the choice of the questionaries were due to their high reliability, validity, and extensive use in previous research measuring self-esteem. [Appendix 1] The questions in most questions related to demographic, social media usage of the volunteers, and their self-esteem level. The social media usage questions are specifically established to measure self-esteem based on Rosenberg. A questionnaire was chosen over other self-report methods, such as interviews because it allowed for the collection of quantitative data and was more time-efficient (Weiner et al., 2023). In the research, the questionnaires are far better than interviews, because, in this process, the researcher was able to get a large amount of data from a huge group of people in the most efficient way consuming less time. However, some of the problems related to questionaries are anonymous questions as the answers to those questions can be inaccurate and have no way of further verification.

B.3: Procedures

The procedure of the research study initially considers conducting a pilot study which was going to be processed with the fellows’ students. However, to increase the resonance and decrease the biased results in the research, the questions are posted by using one of the social media platforms which is Facebook. The positive side of posting it on Facebook is to inverse the accuracy of the results as only the social media-engaged people are going to answer the questions. The drawback of this is that the time of completing the gathering of information is unpredictable (Pellegrino, Abe & Shannon, 2022). To overcome this problem a time limit is set on the questionaries to stop the gathering of the data and minimize the bulk data problem that occurred in analysis. The data analysis process involves spreadsheets to calculate the SE scores. The collected data them further analyzed using the analytic tool SPSS in order to determine the significance of the relationship between the two variables. A copy of the questionnaires was presented in the Appendix. The SE scores and the timing of the activation were used to present the correlation between them which is specifically a Pearson correlation.

B.4: Ethical Considerations

Ethical consideration is one of the most important aspects of research. This particular research involves the social life and self-esteem of a person which significantly increases the value of maintaining ethical considerations in this research. The research highly follows the British Psychological Society code of ethics and conduct (explore.bps.org.uk, 2021). The guidelines related to that code strictly followed the codes which included privacy and confidentiality, consent, and avoiding unnecessary exploitation and conflicts of interest. According to the USW research and good practice code, the participants are strictly protected from any kind of mental terms. The data related to those participants are taken confidential. The relevant data is not presented to any outer platforms. Apart from those, additional measurements such as using password-protected laptops and security analysis tools are used for minimizing data leakage.

C. Results

To understand the relation between the variables SM and SE, mostly two tests are used. Those are the Pearson correlation and the scatter plot. Both tests were conducted with the help of SPSS and the data was gathered from the questionaries.

C.1: Correlation Test

Figure 1: Correlation Analysis

(Source: Self Evaluated)

The correlation table is presented in the second appendix. The correlation analysis was conducted between the time that is been consumed by the volatility in social media platforms and the SE Score of individuals. The correlation coefficient value between the time and SE score was -0.11 which is less than the ideal correlation coefficient value of 0.5. The values P and N were 0.464 and 68. That value indicates that there was no correlation between the two tasted variables. The significance of the correlation is also something that needs to be concerned about. The total number of samples tested for both of the variables was 68.

C.2: Scatter Plot

The scatter plot which is presented in [Appendix 2] is constructed by the value of the two variables Se score and the SM. The scatter plot indicates the significant gap between the points of the two variables. This direction of the data points was linear. However, the data points of the two variables are scattered all over the graph which makes the determination of the trend points trend difficult. The particular scenario indicates no relation between the variable SE and SM. The state line pattern of the points indicates a linear relation between the variables (Gregorich et al., 2021).

D. Discussion

In the research of understanding the relation beaten social media usage and self-esteem, both correlation tests and the scatter plot analysis were conducted. The correlation test highlights a correlation coefficient value of -0.11 between the variable social media usage time and the SE score. The negative indicates a low correlation between the variables. Similar results have been shown in the analysis of scatter plots, where the points of the two variables are scattered everywhere in the graph and do not indicate any upper or lower trend. The results boost the decision of no relation between social media usage and the self-esteem of a person. However, the previous research indicates clear results and relations between those two aspects (Cingel et al. 2022). This the decision is made that the conducted research has flows which result in those nonrealistic results. The most problematic aspect that can be the reason for this result is the small sample size. For psychological research which are conducted on the behavioral aspect of humans, the sample size needs to be significant otherwise the result is going to be unexpected and difficult for achieving any kind of concussion. Apart from that, some of the sections in the questionaries have missing data which can affect the results, particularly the SE score. In the conducted test, the results are also not significant which significantly decreases the accuracy of both the test and the result. A strong reason behind the low significance of the result is that there is not a suitable amount of evidence or in this particular case the sample sizes that can support the linear relation between the variables SE and SM. In this scenario, the regression line is not suitable which can model the relation between the variables in the population.

D.1: Suggestion

For conducting this research in the future, some of the aspects that need to be considered related to changing the size of the sample were primary to increase the sample size to a suitable amount which can ensure a significant result. The analysis also needs to be further simplified by eliminating all the non-essential variables. In addition, the number of variables can be increased which can help in achieving more accurate results and critical decision markings.

E. Conclusion

This particular study highlights the complex relationship between the social media usage of a person and his self-esteem including its related risk benefits. It has been understood from the previous research that, while the excessive use of social media can decrease the self-worth of a person through comparison, more active and mindful social media content consumption can positively affect the person's self-esteem. In this process, a correlation test was conducted with the relevant data from questionaries using a voluntary sampling method. However, the results show non-relativistic results of no correlation between the consumption of social media and self-esteem. This incorrect result is a limited collection of the samples in the correlation test which affects the significance of the results. In future research, those problems are going to be managed by implementing specific strategies and recommendations.

G. References

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• Cingel, D. P., Carter, M. C., & Krause, H. V. (2022). Social media and self-esteem. Current Opinion in Psychology, 45, 101304. Retrieved on: 16-1-2024, From: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352250X22000069
• explore.bps.org.uk, (2021), Code of Ethics and Conduct, Retrieved on: 16-1-2024, From: https://explore.bps.org.uk/content/report-guideline/bpsrep.2021.inf94#:~:text=This%202021%20Code%20of%20Ethics,BPS%20expects%20of%20its%20members
• Gregorich, M., Strohmaier, S., Dunkler, D., & Heinze, G. (2021). Regression with highly correlated predictors: variable omission is not the solution. International journal of environmental research and public health, 18(8), 4259. Retrieved on: 16-1-2024, From: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/4259/pdf
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