Investigation of COVID-19 anxiety and social media addiction in adults in terms of socio demographic characteristics

Increasing internet accessibility affects the levels of social media usage around the world. In addition, the COVID-19 disease has brought about compulsory lockdowns and isolation in societies, and this has also affected social media usage time. Social media has eliminated the constraints of the internet such as time and place via communication tools such as computers, mobile phones, tablets, and it has become a phenomenon that grows day by day in many areas. In addition, it has gained unstoppable power thanks to its sphere of influence that can shape the agenda and have an impact on a country's administrative structure and society. iv Having emerged in Wuhan, China and turned into a global pandemic, this disease caused anxiety by disrupting many areas including health, social life, culture and education all over the world, and also led to physical and psychological distress in many individuals. Individuals' anxiety levels also have an effect on their habits, and there are elements such as information flows, news, newspapers, social media and media tools that trigger this anxiety. The world has been going through a transformation process due to the internet. This is a multifaceted transformation that occurs with the effect of communication technologies. This study is of significance in that it sheds light on this new era in which the effects of the pandemic process are explicit and fills a gap in the relevant literature by providing meaningful data. As a result of the study, a positive, weak-moderate, statistically significant correlation was found between the total scores the participants obtained from the "Coronavirus Anxiety Scale" and the "Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale". As for the participants' socio-demographic background, when the total scores of "Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale" were compared according to the participants' gender, age group, marital status, educational status, occupational group, whether they have children, and their living environment, statistically significant differences were discovered between the groups in all analyses. When the total scores obtained from "Coronavirus Anxiety Scale" were compared based on the same sociodemographic characteristics, it was concluded that gender was the only factor causing a statistically significant difference, and females had higher total anxiety scores than males. It is aimed that all results obtained will contribute to the relevant literature.