The relationship between social media usage and the levels of social anxiety of secondary school students

The aim of this research is to examine the relationship between Social Media usage and the levels of Social Anxiety of secondary school students. The sample of the research was determined by stratified and random sampling method from the middle school level of the state schools of the Ministry of National Education in the districts of Çukurova, Seyhan, Yüreğir and Sarıçam. 226 girls, 223 boys totally 449 students aged between 9-16 have participated in the research. The data was obtained by using the " Çapa Social Phobia Scale for Children and Adolescents" developed by Demir(1997) and the " Personal Information Form" prepared by the researcher. In the analysis of the data, one-way analysis of variance ANOVA was used to understand whether or not Social Media hours used, Social Media purposes and the number of Social Media accounts owned differ according to Social Anxiety levels. According to the research, it has been found out that there is a significant relationship between Social Network using time and Social Anxiety level. In the research, it has been detected that the students who use the social network for 7 hours or more have a higher level of social anxiety than the ones who never use it or use the social network for 1-3 hours, 3-5 hours or 5-7 hours a day. In the relationship between Social Network usage purposes and the Social Anxiety level, it has been found out that there is a significant relationship between " Sharing photos", " Sharing videos" and "Spending free time" purposes and their Social Phobia levels. On the other hand, no meaningful relationship has been found between '' Making new friends'', ''Chatting online'', '' Commenting'', '' Getting information'', ''Sharing news'', ''Playing games'','' Keeping in touch with acquaintances'' and '' Checking what friends are doing'' purposes and Social Phobia levels. In the relationship between Social Media accounts used and Social Anxiety, ''Youtube'', '' Tumblr'' and '' Pinterest'' accounts have been found to have significant differences with social anxiety. However, no meaningful differences have been found between ''Facebook'', '' Twitter'', '' Google+'','' Instagram'', '' Foursquare'', '' Vine'', '' Blogspot'', '' Skype'' and '' Whatsapp'' usage and Social Anxiety levels. Keywords: Social phobia, Social anxiety, Social media, social network, secondary school, middle school