The Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Associations Between Social Media and Mental Health Among a Large Sample of Adolescents, Inclusive of Transgender/Gender-Diverse Adolescents.
Curle M, Hunter S, et al. • Journal of adolescence • 2026
Among Canadian adolescents, SM time was associated with poorer mental health outcomes both cross-sectionally and over 1 year, with cisgender girls experiencing significantly larger negative associations between SM time and mental health outcomes in comparison to cisgender boys and transgender/gender-diverse adolescents cross-sectionally.
Key Findings
Results
Greater social media time was cross-sectionally associated with worse mental health outcomes across multiple domains in Canadian adolescents.
Cross-sectional analyses were conducted for two school years: 2021/2022 (n=58,289) and 2022/2023 (n=44,777)
An additional hour per day of social media browsing/scrolling was significantly associated with increased depression and anxiety symptoms
Additional social media time was also associated with decreased flourishing and poorer personal relationships and emotional regulation
Multilevel linear modeling was used to account for the nested structure of the data
Results
Longitudinal increases in social media time were associated with worse mental health outcomes one year later.
The linked longitudinal analysis included n=26,743 adolescents followed from 2021/2022 to 2022/2023
One additional hour per day of social media time from baseline to follow-up was significantly associated with increased depression and anxiety symptoms at follow-up
Longitudinal increases in social media time were also associated with decreased flourishing and poorer personal relationships and emotional regulation at follow-up
The exposure variable in longitudinal models was the change in social media time from baseline to follow-up
Results
Gender moderated the cross-sectional associations between social media time and mental health outcomes, but did not moderate longitudinal associations.
Gender was categorized into cisgender girls, cisgender boys, and transgender/gender-diverse adolescents
Gender was a significant moderator of social media time and mental health outcome associations cross-sectionally
Gender did not moderate the association between change in social media time and mental health outcomes longitudinally
The moderation analysis was conducted using multilevel linear modeling with gender as the moderator variable
Results
Cisgender girls experienced significantly larger negative associations between social media time and mental health outcomes compared to cisgender boys and transgender/gender-diverse adolescents in cross-sectional analyses.
This pattern was observed cross-sectionally but was not replicated in the longitudinal analysis
The comparison groups were cisgender boys and transgender/gender-diverse adolescents
Transgender/gender-diverse adolescents were included as a distinct category, making this study notable for its inclusion of this population
The finding held across the mental health outcomes measured: anxiety, depression, flourishing, personal relationships, and emotional regulation
Methods
The study examined five distinct mental health outcome variables in relation to social media use among adolescents ages 12–18.
Outcome variables included anxiety, depression, flourishing, personal relationships, and emotional regulation
Outcomes were measured at follow-up in longitudinal models
The exposure variable was time spent browsing/scrolling social media
Data were drawn from the Cannabis, Obesity, Mental health, Physical activity, Alcohol, Smoking, and Sedentary behaviour (COMPASS) study, a large Canadian school-based cohort
What This Means
This research suggests that spending more time on social media is linked to poorer mental health in Canadian teenagers across multiple measures, including higher anxiety and depression, lower sense of flourishing, worse personal relationships, and poorer emotional regulation. These patterns were found both at a single point in time and over the course of one year, meaning that increases in social media use were associated with worsening mental health outcomes a year later. The study included a large sample of over 58,000 adolescents aged 12–18 and is notable for explicitly including transgender and gender-diverse youth as a distinct group.
This research also suggests that the relationship between social media and mental health differs by gender, but in a more complex way than might be expected. Cisgender girls showed the strongest negative associations between social media time and mental health outcomes in cross-sectional (single time point) analyses, compared to both cisgender boys and transgender/gender-diverse adolescents. However, when looking at changes over time, gender did not significantly change how social media use affected mental health, meaning all gender groups were similarly affected by increases in social media use longitudinally.
The inclusion of transgender and gender-diverse adolescents is a meaningful step forward, as this population is often excluded from large-scale studies. The findings highlight that social media use is broadly associated with worse mental health for adolescents regardless of gender identity, while also showing that the cross-sectional pattern is particularly pronounced for cisgender girls. This research contributes to ongoing discussions about adolescent screen time and wellbeing, though it cannot establish that social media use directly causes mental health problems.
Curle M, Hunter S, Leatherdale S, Patte K, Faulkner G, Goldfield G, et al.. (2026). The Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Associations Between Social Media and Mental Health Among a Large Sample of Adolescents, Inclusive of Transgender/Gender-Diverse Adolescents.. Journal of adolescence. https://doi.org/10.1002/jad.70151