The multimodal nature of Snapchat in close relationships: Toward a social presence-based theoretical framework

Tactile emoticons: Conveying social emotions and intentions with manual and robotic tactile feedback during social media communications

Touch offers important non-verbal possibilities for socioaffective communication. Yet most digital communications lack capabilities regarding exchanging affective tactile messages (tactile emoticons). Additionally, previous studies on tactile emoticons have not capitalised on knowledge about the affective effects of certain mechanoreceptors in the human skin, e.g., the C-Tactile (CT) system. Here, we examined whether gentle manual stroking delivered in velocities known to optimally activate the CT system (defined as 'tactile emoticons'), during lab-simulated social media communications could convey increased feelings of social support and other prosocial intentions compared to (1) either stroking touch at CT sub-optimal velocities, or (2) standard visual emoticons. Participants (N = 36) felt more social intent with CT-optimal compared to sub-optimal velocities, or visual emoticons. In a second, preregistered study (N = 52), we investigated whether combining visual emoticons with tactile emoticons, this time delivered at CT-optimal velocities by a soft robotic device, could enhance the perception of prosocial intentions and affect participants' physiological measures (e.g., skin conductance rate) in comparison to visual emoticons alone. Visuotactile emoticons conveyed more social intent overall and in anxious participants affected physiological measures more than visual emoticons. The results suggest that emotional social media communications can be meaningfully enhanced by tactile emoticons.

The Relationship Between Smartphone Addiction and the Interpersonal Competence of Chinese Private College Students: A Moderated Mediation Model

Purpose

As an aspect of the lives of private college students in China, interpersonal competence (IC) is important to their socialization and employment competence. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between Chinese private college students' smartphone addiction (SPA) and IC, the mediating effect of negative emotions (NE), and the moderating effect of psychological resilience (PR).

Samples and Methods

Using simple random sampling, 5473 Chinese private college students (male 74.5%, urban household registration 51.6%, served as a student leader 31.5%) were recruited.

Results

The results showed that (1) SPA positively predicted IC; (2) NE partially mediated the relationship between SPA and IC; and (3) PR moderated the relationships between SPA and NE, NE and IC, SPA and IC.

Conclusion

These findings provide a new perspective to improve Chinese private college students' socialization and their employment competitiveness.

Linking video chatting, phone calling, text messaging, and social media with peers to adolescent connectedness

For 14 days three times per day (6072 observations), adolescents (N = 207, Mage  = 15.45 years) reported their digital (i.e., video chatting, texting, social media, and phone calling) communication with peers and their social connectedness. Controlling for in-person interactions, adolescents felt more connected in hours when they had communicated with peers by video chatting, texting, or social media, but not phone calling. Girls communicated with peers via text and social media more than boys, and boys talked on the phone more than girls. Boys who talked, texted, or video chatted more on average reported higher connectedness on average, whereas girls did not. As the links with connectedness were only found at the hourly- and not the daily level, results highlight that a sense of connectedness from digital media may be fleeting in nature.

Social media and close relationships: a puzzle of connection and disconnection

Social media and well-being have been a subject of intense debate in research, policy, and the popular press. In this review, we discuss social media use and well-being in the context of close relationships, including romantic partners, friends, and family, by drawing on research that connects social media use to both relational connection and relational disconnection. In an effort to disentangle a puzzle of connection and disconnection, we argue for the duality of social media effects in close relationships in which behaviors that facilitate connection and disconnection are intertwined. We call for research to develop frameworks that focus on (1) the interplay of social media behaviors and (2) the relational processes that underlie the twists and turns of social media connection.