Instant messaging use and worry experiences: an exploration into daily instant messaging use patterns and associations with experiences of worry through ecological momentary assessment

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Date
2021-12-21
Authors
Twohig, Ian
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University College Cork
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Abstract
The emergence of the internet paved the way for rapid innovations in personal technologies. Personal computing quickly became part of our everyday lives, and new forms of digital technologies quickly emerged that changed the way we seek information, consume media content, and communicate with one another. Whilst many of these technologies has brought many benefits to modern-day life, there are concerns regarding the negative implications such technologies have our personal well-being. Information Systems researchers contribute to these discussions in a domain known as the dark side of technology use. The addiction area of this domain is one of the most popular and complex with many conflicting arguments that make it difficult to provide a clear narrative surrounding the relationship between well-being and use. There is a growing number of studies that support no association between technology use and poor mental well-being also. This research thesis is motivated by the lack of consensus regarding these discussions of concern. Informed directly by an evaluation and synthesis of the literature, the objective of this research was to explore daily Instant Messaging use patterns and associations with experiences of worry. Ecological Momentary Assessment was adopted to operationalise the research objective. Through an iterative process of the methodological design, this research conducted three studies seminal to contributions presented in this thesis. The final study of this research identified daily instant messaging use patterns through the formulation of a number of themes. Each newly formed theme supports our understandings of the complexity of daily instant messaging use. Additionally, this research did not find any clear association between daily instant messaging use patterns and worry experiences. In summary, this research can be observed as a prerequisite to enquiries into the relationship between social networking app use in general and mental well-being. 
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Keywords
Worry , Anxiety , Ecological momentary assessment , Instant messaging , Social networking apps , Mental health , Experience sampling , WhatsApp , Addictive behaviour , Technological addiction
Citation
Twohig, I. 2021. Instant messaging use and worry experiences: an exploration into daily instant messaging use patterns and associations with experiences of worry through ecological momentary assessment. PhD Thesis, University College Cork.