Examining the relationship between social media addiction, executive functions, impulsivity, and personality in university

The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between social media addiction and executive functions, personality, and impulsivity using neuropsychological tests. The study sample consisted of 53 female and 27 male students from Bolu Abant Izzet Baysal University. The Social Media Addiction Scale (SMAS) was used to measure participants' social media addiction. Executive functions were measured by the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), Stroop Test TBAG Form, Wechsler Memory Scale-III Letter-Number Sequencing Subtest (HSD), Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-IV Matrix Reasoning Test, impulsivity by the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale Short Form (BIS-11-KF), personality by the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Short Form (EPQ-KF), mental well-being by the Short Form of the Well-being Measure Scale (WEMIOÖ), depression by the Burns Depression Scale (BDS), and anxiety by the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI). One-way ANOVA, Tukey test, mediation analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM) were applied to the research data. The results showed that executive functions differed according to the level of social media addiction. Participants with high social media addiction had lower performance in set-shifting, selective attention, working memory, reasoning, and decision-making than those with low social media addiction. Statistically significant differences were found between social media addiction levels and neuroticism and lie sub-dimensions of personality, inability to plan and motor impulsivity sub-dimensions of impulsivity, and scores of depression, anxiety, and mental well-being. According to the findings of the mediation analysis and SEM, the performance of executive functions was found to be influenced by fluid intelligence through social media addiction. It was also found that social media addiction was significantly predicted by the BIS-11-KF latent variable. The results were discussed within the framework of the literature, and recommendations were made for future research. KEYWORDS: Social Media Addiction, Behavioral Addiction, Executive Functions, Personality, Impulsivity, Structural Equation Modeling (SEM)