ArticleBMC psychology2023
A rise in social media use in adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic: the French validation of the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale in a Canadian cohort.
Article in BMC psychology, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 22 citations in OpenAlex.
- Impact of digital addiction on youth health: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Journal of behavioral addictions · 2025Pooled it
- Social Media Use Among People Living with Chronic Pain: Cross-Sectional Study of Associated Factors.Journal of medical Internet research · 2026Article
- The Swedish version of the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale: A psychometric evaluation among adolescents.Addictive behaviors reports · 2026Article
- Problematic social media use among recreational cannabis users in Québec: A Cross-Sectional study.Addictive behaviors reports · 2026Article
- Racial Discrimination Predicting Sleep: Examining Social Media and Television/Digital Media use During the COVID-19 Pandemic as Moderators among College Students of Color.Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities · 2026Article
- The Association Between Negative Online Behaviours and Problematic Social Media Use in Adolescents: Comparing Psychiatric Inpatients and Community Participants.Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry = Journal de l'Academie canadienne de psychiatrie de l'enfant et de l'adolescent · 2025Article
- Computer vision syndrome: a comprehensive literature review.Future science OA · 2025Review
- Looking Back After the First Year of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Parents' View on Screen Media Use, Psychopathology, and Psychological Burden in a Clinical Sample of Children and Adolescents.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Social media use, risk behavior engagement, and mental health among middle adolescents in the Caribbean.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Changes in Internet Activities and Influencing Factors for Problematic Internet Use During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Korean Adolescents: Repeated Cross-Sectional Study.JMIR pediatrics and parenting · 2025Article
- Social Media Algorithms and Teen Addiction: Neurophysiological Impact and Ethical Considerations.Cureus · 2025Review
- Beyond the Screen: A Comprehensive Analysis of Emotional Skills and Social Networking in French Young Adults.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2024Article
- The TikTok Addiction Scale: Development and validation.AIMS public health · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionSocial media use has grown dramatically since its inception in the early 2000s and has further increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. Problematic use of social media (PUSM) is a type of behavioural addiction which has generated increasing interest among mental health clinicians and scholars in the last decade. PUSM is associated with multiple psychiatric conditions and is known to interfere with patients' daily functioning. There is no single accepted definition of PUSM, nor means of measuring it, in the literature. The Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale (BSMAS) is a helpful tool for identifying PUSM. This paper aims to validate BSMAS and to translate it from English into French, with the goal of making this clinical screening tool for PUSM available in French-language contexts.
methodThis study explored the psychometric validity of the French version of the BSMAS in a sample of 247 adolescents, who were either psychiatric inpatients (the hospitalized group, n = 123) or recruited in local high schools (the community group, n = 124).
resultsThe adolescents in the sample reported an increase in their social media use during the COVID-19 pandemic. This increase was more pronounced in the hospitalized group. Confirmatory factorial analysis showed an excellent fit, very good internal consistency and established convergent validity for the French version of the BSMAS. A total of 15.4% of the hospitalization group and 6.5% of the community group met the recommended clinical cutoff of 24 on the BSMAS, suggesting problematic use of social media.
conclusionsThe French version of BSMAS is a psychometrically validated and clinically useful tool to screen for PUSM in adolescents.
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