Young adults asked to sharply reduce their social media use generally struggled to stick with the limits.
Those who did cut back didn’t report greater improvements in well-being than people who continued using social media normally.
The findings suggest that a one-size-fits-all time limit may not be the best approach for everyone.
If you’ve ever decided you’re going to spend less time scrolling, only to find yourself back on your phone later that day, new research may feel familiar. A set of studies looked at whether asking young adults to significantly reduce their social media use could improve their well-being.
The research attempted to replicate a 2018 study that found some benefits from limiting social media use, including reductions in loneliness and, among participants who initially had high levels of depression, depressive symptoms. Researchers wanted to see whether those findings would hold up now that social media has become even more deeply woven into everyday life.
The answer wasn’t quite what they expected.
Researchers put limits to the test
Across the first three studies, researchers recruited 644 iPhone users under age 30, including both students and nonstudents. Participants provided screenshots from Apple’s Screen Time feature and completed weekly assessments measuring factors including depression, anxiety, loneliness, autonomy, emotions, and life satisfaction.
Participants were randomly assigned either to continue using social media as usual or to limit their use for three weeks, generally to 30 minutes per day. Researchers also tested other approaches, including limiting interactions to people participants knew offline and restricting the apps participants believed had the biggest effect on their mental health.
The researchers later conducted a fourth study involving 229 young adults. This time, the limit was relaxed to 60 minutes per day, and participants received daily reminders.
The limits were hard to follow
None of the approaches produced meaningful improvements in well-being compared with normal social media use. But there was a major complication: Most participants didn’t actually stick to the limits.
At the beginning of the first three studies, participants were using social media for nearly three hours a day on average. Of the 346 people in the time-limit groups who provided follow-up data, only 10% stayed under 30 minutes for even one week, while fewer than 5% did so for at least two weeks.
In the fourth study, more than half of participants never met the one-hour target on any of the 21 days. Only two participants met the target every day.
That means the findings don’t prove that substantially reducing social media use can’t improve well-being. Instead, they highlight how difficult strict limits can be to maintain — and how complicated social media use has become.
“It’s not just a site; it’s an entire environment where you’re interacting, viewing content, sharing content, and expressing yourself,” researcher Andrea Howard said in a news release.
For consumers, the takeaway may be less about hitting a magic number of minutes and more about figuring out what role social media plays in your own life. The researchers suggest that people who want to change their habits may benefit from personalized plans, gradual reductions, or continued support rather than a universal time limit.
“If you feel like you would like to put your phone away for a certain number of hours a day, then there’s no reason not to try it,” Howard said. “That’s a personal improvement or self-management activity.”