AWeSome (Adolescents, Well-being, and Social Media) investigates why social media make some teens happy while leaving others feeling blue. The team uses experience sampling designs, in which hundreds of adolescents are invited to answer short surveys on their smartphones across multiple weeks. Their answers are analyzed with innovative methods that enable studying the effects of social media on each individual adolescent. ‘Such person-specific effects have not been studied before, simply because the methods of analysis to do so did not yet exist’, states Valkenburg. ‘Team AWeSome is also one of the first to study the social media archives of adolescents to understand what they do and see on social media and how their experiences influence their well-being.’

The Outstanding Interdisciplinary Contribution Award  was issued during the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence (SRA) on Friday 4 March.

More about AWeSome

Project AWeSome is funded by the NWO Gravitation grant Consortium on Individual Development and the NWO Spinoza Prize awarded to Patti Valkenburg. It is a collaboration between three Dutch universities with a team of seven researchers: Patti Valkenburg, Ine Beyens, Irene van Driel, Teun Siebers and Tim Verbeij from the University of Amsterdam; Loes Keijsers from the Erasmus University and Loes Pouwels of Radboud University.

About the Society for Research on Adolescence

The Society for Research on Adolescence is a scientific association that aims to promote the understanding of the phase of adolescence and the well-being of each adolescent. All disciplines, from psychiatry to anthropology are represented in this society.  It is one of the largest scientific organizations with a focus on adolescence.

Contact

For more information you can contact: Prof. Dr. Patti M. Valkenburg, p.m.valkenburg@uva.nl