Department of Neuroscience, Biomedicine and Movement Science, Section of Clinical Psychology, University of Verona, Verona, Italy.
Department of Psychology, Educational Science and Human Movement, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
JMIR Res Protoc. 2024 Sep 9;13:e58739. doi: 10.2196/58739.
Social media (SM) use constitutes a large portion of midadolescents' daily lives as a way of peer interaction. A significant percentage of adolescents experience intense or problematic social media use (PSMU), an etiologically complex behavior potentially associated with psychological distress. To date, studies longitudinally testing for risk or protective factors of PSMU, and collecting qualitative data are still scarce among midadolescents. Self-help interventions specifically targeting PSMU in this population and involving midadolescents in co-creation are needed.
The 2-year SMART multicenter project aims to (1) advance knowledge on PSMU; (2) co-design an unguided self-help app for promoting awareness and functional SM use; and (3) test feasibility and provide preliminary findings on its effectiveness to further improve and adapt the app.
The SMART project is organized in 3 phases: phase 1 will focus on knowledge advancement on PSMU and its risk and protective factors using a longitudinal design; phase 2 will explore adolescents perspectives using qualitative approach and will co-design an unguided self-help app for reducing PSMU, which will be evaluated and adapted in phase 3. Around 1500 midadolescents (aged 14-18 years) will be recruited in northern, central, and southern Italy to investigate the potential intra- and interpersonal psychological risk and protective factors for PSMU and define specific PSMU profiles and test for its association with psychological distress. Subjective (self-report) PSMU's psychosocial risk or protective factors will be assessed at 3 different time points and Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) will be used. Moreover, focus groups will be performed in a subsample of midadolescents to collect the adolescents' unique point of view on PSMU and experiences with SM. Those previous results will inform the self-help app, which will be co-designed through working groups with adolescents. Subsequently, the SMART app will be deployed and adapted, after testing its feasibility and potential effectiveness in a pilot study.
The project is funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research as part of a national grant (PRIN, "Progetti di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale"). The research team received an official notice of research funding approval in July 2023 (Project Code 2022LC4FT7). The project was preregistered on Open Science Framework, while the ethics approval was obtained in November 2023. We started the enrollments in December 2023, with the final follow-up data to be collected within May 2025.
The innovative aspects of the SMART project will deepen the conceptualization of PSMU and of its biopsychosocial antecedents among midadolescents, with relevant scientific, technological, and socioeconomic impacts. The advancement of knowledge and the developed self-help app for PSMU will timely respond to midadolescents' increased loneliness and psychological burden due to COVID-19 pandemic and humanitarian crisis.
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INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/58739.
社交媒体（SM）的使用是青少年日常生活中同伴互动的重要组成部分。很大一部分青少年经历过强烈或有问题的社交媒体使用（PSMU），这是一种潜在与心理困扰相关的病因复杂的行为。迄今为止，在青少年中进行纵向测试 PSMU 的风险或保护因素并收集定性数据的研究仍然很少。需要针对该人群的 PSMU 进行自助干预，并让青少年共同参与创作。
为期 2 年的 SMART 多中心项目旨在：（1）推进对 PSMU 的认识；（2）共同设计用于提高意识和促进功能性 SM 使用的无指导自助应用程序；（3）测试其可行性并提供初步效果发现，以进一步改进和调整应用程序。
SMART 项目分为 3 个阶段：第 1 阶段将使用纵向设计专注于 PSMU 及其风险和保护因素的知识进步；第 2 阶段将使用定性方法探索青少年的观点，并共同设计用于减少 PSMU 的无指导自助应用程序，该应用程序将在第 3 阶段进行评估和调整。将在意大利北部、中部和南部招募约 1500 名青少年（年龄在 14-18 岁之间），以研究 PSMU 的潜在内在和人际心理风险和保护因素，并确定特定的 PSMU 特征，并测试其与心理困扰的关联。在 3 个不同的时间点评估主观（自我报告）PSMU 的心理社会风险或保护因素，并将使用生态瞬时评估（EMA）。此外，将在青少年的一个子样本中进行焦点小组，以收集青少年对 PSMU 的独特观点和他们对 SM 的体验。这些先前的结果将为自助应用程序提供信息，该应用程序将通过与青少年合作的工作组共同设计。随后，将部署 SMART 应用程序并进行调整，在试点研究中测试其可行性和潜在效果。
该项目由意大利大学和研究部作为国家拨款的一部分（PRIN，“国家重要利益项目”）资助。研究团队于 2023 年 7 月收到了研究资金批准的正式通知（项目代码 2022LC4FT7）。该项目在开放科学框架上进行了预先登记，同时在 2023 年 11 月获得了伦理批准。我们于 2023 年 12 月开始招募参与者，将于 2025 年 5 月之前完成最后一次随访数据收集。
SMART 项目的创新方面将深化青少年 PSMU 的概念化及其生物心理社会前因，具有重要的科学、技术和社会经济影响。知识的进步和开发的 PSMU 自助应用程序将及时应对由于 COVID-19 大流行和人道主义危机而导致青少年孤独感和心理负担增加的问题。
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国际注册报告标识符（IRRID）：DERR1-10.2196/58739。
