CYBERPSYCHOLOGY, BEHAVIOR, AND SOCIAL NETWORKING

Volume 00, Number 00, 2012 RAPID COMMUNICATION

Media Multitasking Is Associated with Symptoms

Mark W. Becker, Ph.D., Reem Alzahabi, B.S., and Christopher J. Hopwood, Ph.D.

Abstract

We investigated whether multitasking with media was a unique predictor of depression and social anxiety symptoms.
Participants (N = 318) completed measures of their media use, personality characteristics, depression, and social
anxiety. Regression analyses revealed that increased media multitasking was associated with higher depression and
social anxiety symptoms, even after controlling for overall media use and the personality traits of neuroticism and
extraversion. The unique association between media multitasking and these measures of psychosocial dysfunction
suggests that the growing trend of multitasking with media may represent a unique risk factor for mental health
problems related to mood and anxiety. Further, the results strongly suggest that future research investigating the
impact of media use on mental health needs to consider the role that multitasking with media plays in the relationship.

Introduction Further, this type of poor attentional control has been sug-
1 gested to maintain and perhaps cause depression18 and
T he recent dramatic increase in media use has been
accompanied by a rising concern that interactions with
media may be replacing face-to-face interactions,2 resulting in
anxiety.19 The finding that multitasking with media may be
associated with poor attentional control, coupled with the
findings that attentional control is related to psychosocial
lower quality social interactions3,4 and impaired psychosocial
functioning, begs the question of whether multitasking with
functioning.5,6 Consistent with these concerns, a number of
media may be a unique risk factor for poor mental health.
early studies reported associations between heavy media use
Here we indexed participants’ overall media usage and media
and mental health problems.5,7,8 More recent research has
multitasking to investigate the extent to which these aspects of
suggested that the relationship between media use and psy-
media use are associated with depression and/or social anxiety.
chosocial functioning is more complex and nuanced.9,10 Spe-
We targeted these disorders because they are among the most
cifically, it has been suggested that this relationship may
common mental disorders20 and both have been associated with
depend on the type of media being used,11 the purpose for
both media usage5,21 and attentional control.18,19 We were par-
which it is being used,12,13 and the individual personality
ticularly interested in the possibility that media multitasking
characteristics of the user.14–16
might represent a specific risk factor for psychosocial dysfunc-
Although this more nuanced approach acknowledges that
tion, independent of both dispositional risk factors (i.e., person-
‘‘what’’ people are doing with media has rapidly changed, it
ality traits) and overall media use. Thus, before evaluating the
generally ignores that ‘‘how’’ people interact with media has
relationship between media multitasking and psychological
also undergone a dramatic shift. Specifically, there has been a
well-being, we controlled for both overall media use and the
tremendous increase in the amount of time that people spend
well-known associations between the traits of neuroticism and
multitasking with media (simultaneously accessing two or
extraversion and mood and anxiety disorders.22
more forms of media). Indeed, while overall media use
among America’s youth increased by 20 percent over the past
Methods
decade, the amount of time spent multitasking with media
(simultaneously interacting with more than one form of Three hundred and 19 college undergraduates (222 fe-
media) increased by over 119 percent over the same period.1 males) completed a battery of online surveys for course
This dramatic shift in how people engage with media may credit or extra-credit.* The patient health questionnaire (PHQ)23
be important to understanding the relationship between
media use and mental health. Recent reports suggest that
*Based on a the Personality Assessment Inventory Infrequency
media multitasking may be uniquely associated with deficits scale,28 data from 44 additional participants were identified as not
in basic cognitive processes such as the ability to successfully sufficiently attending to the content of the assessment questions.
filter out irrelevant information and ignore distraction.17 Their data were eliminated from further analysis.

Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan.

1
2 BECKER ET AL.

Table 1. Summary Statistics of Survey Measures sion analyses, one with the social anxiety (SPIN) and the sec-
ond with the depression (PHQ) measure as the dependent
Mean SD Range Cronbach’s a variable. Predictors were entered into the regression model in
Neuroticism 2.89 0.75 1.13–4.63 0.83 three steps and the change in R2 from one step in the model to
Extraversion 3.33 0.77 1.13–5.00 0.87 the next was used to evaluate whether the additional factor
SPIN (anxiety) 15.28 15.28 0–59 0.93 was uniquely associated with the dependent variable. The first
PHQ (depression) 5.22 4.90 0–27 0.89 step consisted of the neuroticism and extraversion scales from
the BFI to control for dispositional factors associated with
PHQ, patient health questionnaire; SPIN, social phobia inventory. mood and anxiety disorders.22 The second step added the total
media usage (M = 70.6 hours, SD = 48.8) factor to control for
overall media use. The third step added media multitasking
and social phobia inventory (SPIN)24 were used to measure (M = 4.31, SD = 1.77). We used this approach because the sec-
depressed mood and social anxiety, respectively. Participants ond stage of the model included personality and media factors
also completed the neuroticism and extraversion scales of the that have been previously suggested to be related to depres-
big five inventory (BFI).25 The above measures are all well- sion and/or anxiety, while the third allowed us to determine
established survey measures. whether media multitasking adds a unique contribution to the
The Media Multitasking Index Questionnaire (MMI)17 was model above and beyond these previously known factors.
used to index total media use and media multitasking. This Results from regression analyses are given in Table 3.
measure was developed by Ophir, Nass, and Wagner.17 It When social anxiety (SPIN) was the dependent variable, the
asks participants how many hours per week they use each model containing only extraversion and neuroticism was a
of the following 12 primary forms of media: television, significantly better fit than the base model [R2 change = 0.27,
computer-based video, music, nonmusical audio, video or F(2, 316) = 59.33, p < 0.001]; adding total media usage in the
computer games, telephone and mobile phone, instant mes- second step did not significantly improve the model’s fit [R2
saging, SMS (text messaging), email, web surfing, and other change = 0.004, F(1, 315) = 1.68, p = 0.20], but adding media
computer-based applications (such as word processing). multitasking in the third step significantly improved the fit of
Then for a given primary media form, participants indicate the model [R2 change = 0.03, F(1, 314) = 14.88, p < 0.001]. When
how often they use this media concurrently with the each of depression (PHQ) was the dependent variable, the model
the other 11 media forms. This is done by making 11 ratings of with neuroticism and extraversion was a better fit than the
‘‘Most of the time ( = 1),’’ ‘‘Some of the time ( = 0.67),’’ ‘‘A little base model [R2 change = 0.21, F(2, 316) = 42.96, p < 0.001],
of the time ( = 0.33),’’ or ‘‘Never ( = 0).’’ These 11 responses are adding total media usage improved the model fit [R2
summed to provide a measure of the amount of concurrent change = 0.03, F(1, 315) = 12.43, p < 0.001], and adding the
media used while using that primary form of media. This multitasking factor further improved the model’s fit [R2
sum is then multiplied by the number of hours using that change = 0.03, F(1, 314) = 11.31, p = 0.001].
form of media and divided by the total amount of time using
all forms of primary media. This gives an index for that form Discussion
of primary media. This index is calculated for each of the
primary forms of media and the overall MMI score is the sum After controlling for both personality traits (neuroticism
of these individual indexes. Thus, the MMI indicates the and extraversion) and overall media use, media multitasking
average amount of media multitasking that is occurring was a unique predictor of self-reported symptoms of both
during a typical hour of media usage. depression and social anxiety. Consistent with the claim that
media multitasking represents a unique risk factor, overall
media use was not associated with social anxiety, but multi-
Results
tasking was. In addition, although both media multitasking
Table 1 presents the descriptive statistics for our person- and neuroticism were associated with higher scores on de-
ality survey measures and Table 2 presents the correlation pression and social anxiety measures, neuroticism and me-
matrix between our measures. As hypothesized, media dia multitasking were themselves uncorrelated (see Table 1).
multitasking was significantly related to overall media use, This finding provocatively suggests that the personality traits
depression, and social phobia. To evaluate potential unique of neuroticism and extraversion may be related to one’s dis-
relations between media multitasking and psychosocial positional susceptibility to mood and anxiety problems,
functioning, we conducted two hierarchical multiple regres- whereas media multitasking may be an environmental

Table 2. Correlations Between Measures

Neuroticism Extraversion SPIN PHQ Media use Multitasking

Neuroticism 1
Extraversion - 0.20** 1
SPIN (anxiety) 0.35** - 0.45** 1
PHQ (Depression) 0.46** - 0.16 0.40** 1
Total media use 0.01 0.09 0.03 0.17* 1
Media multitasking - 0.01 0.06 0.17* 0.20** 0.36** 1

*p < 0.01; **p < 0.001.

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