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Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence

In this study, we examined how technology impacts adolescents’ perceptions of, and affective responses to solitude, as well as how adolescents’ own motivations for solitude (shyness, affinity for aloneness) were related to these reactions. Participants were N = 437 adolescents (297 girls; M(age) = 1...

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Autores principales: Coplan, Robert J., McVarnock, Alicia, Hipson, Will E., Bowker, Julie C.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: SAGE Publications 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9650721/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36397736
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/01650254221113460
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author Coplan, Robert J.
McVarnock, Alicia
Hipson, Will E.
Bowker, Julie C.
author_facet Coplan, Robert J.
McVarnock, Alicia
Hipson, Will E.
Bowker, Julie C.
author_sort Coplan, Robert J.
collection PubMed
description In this study, we examined how technology impacts adolescents’ perceptions of, and affective responses to solitude, as well as how adolescents’ own motivations for solitude (shyness, affinity for aloneness) were related to these reactions. Participants were N = 437 adolescents (297 girls; M(age) = 16.15 years, standard deviation (SD) = .50) who were presented with a series of hypothetical vignettes asking them to imagine themselves in the context of pure solitude (alone in their room with the door closed), as well as being physically alone but engaged in increasing levels of virtual social engagement, including passive (e.g., watching videos, scrolling, but no direct social engagement), active (e.g., texting), and audio-visual (e.g., Facetime) technology use. Following each vignette, participants reported their perceptions of being alone and positive/negative affective responses. We also measured general motivations for solitude (shyness, affinity for aloneness). Among the results, adolescents perceived themselves as less alone in vignettes depicting increasing virtual social engagement. Affective benefits of increased virtual engagement were also found (e.g., less loneliness/boredom/sadness, greater social connection/contentment). However, these effects were moderated by solitude motivations, with different patterns evident as a function of participant shyness and affinity for aloneness. Findings highlight the importance of considering the nature of adolescents’ technology use when alone, as well as motivations for solitude, when considering links between solitude and well-being.
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spelling pubmed-96507212022-11-15 Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence Coplan, Robert J. McVarnock, Alicia Hipson, Will E. Bowker, Julie C. Int J Behav Dev Special Section: Solitude Across the Lifepan In this study, we examined how technology impacts adolescents’ perceptions of, and affective responses to solitude, as well as how adolescents’ own motivations for solitude (shyness, affinity for aloneness) were related to these reactions. Participants were N = 437 adolescents (297 girls; M(age) = 16.15 years, standard deviation (SD) = .50) who were presented with a series of hypothetical vignettes asking them to imagine themselves in the context of pure solitude (alone in their room with the door closed), as well as being physically alone but engaged in increasing levels of virtual social engagement, including passive (e.g., watching videos, scrolling, but no direct social engagement), active (e.g., texting), and audio-visual (e.g., Facetime) technology use. Following each vignette, participants reported their perceptions of being alone and positive/negative affective responses. We also measured general motivations for solitude (shyness, affinity for aloneness). Among the results, adolescents perceived themselves as less alone in vignettes depicting increasing virtual social engagement. Affective benefits of increased virtual engagement were also found (e.g., less loneliness/boredom/sadness, greater social connection/contentment). However, these effects were moderated by solitude motivations, with different patterns evident as a function of participant shyness and affinity for aloneness. Findings highlight the importance of considering the nature of adolescents’ technology use when alone, as well as motivations for solitude, when considering links between solitude and well-being. SAGE Publications 2022-08-10 2022-11 /pmc/articles/PMC9650721/ /pubmed/36397736 http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/01650254221113460 Text en © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
spellingShingle Special Section: Solitude Across the Lifepan
Coplan, Robert J.
McVarnock, Alicia
Hipson, Will E.
Bowker, Julie C.
Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title_full Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title_fullStr Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title_full_unstemmed Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title_short Alone with my phone? Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
title_sort alone with my phone? examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence
topic Special Section: Solitude Across the Lifepan
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9650721/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36397736
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/01650254221113460
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