Abstract
The purpose of this study was to better understand the relationship between social media use and depression, by helping eliminate any inconsistencies from prior findings and expanding the research to include other possible contributing factors that have yet to be explored. Participants consisted of 18-34-year-olds residing in the United States. The study was conducted through an online survey on SurveyMonkey. Participants (N = 198) reported that there are several potential causal factors of depression that result from the use of social media. These include envy (40.45%), unsettling news (15.73%), exclusion (12.36%), negative posts (12.36%), conflicting views (8.99%), cyberbullying (3.37%), too much time spent on social media (3.37%) and recalling past experiences (3.37%). These results confirmed that social media envy is a potential causal factor of depression. Furthermore, it was found that there are additional causal factors resulting from social media use.