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RESEARCH ARTICLE

Face it, don’t Facebook it: Impacts of Social Media Addiction on Mindfulness, Coping Strategies and the Consequence on Emotional Exhaustion Kanokporn Sriwilai & Peerayuth Charoensukmongkol*†

International College, National Institute of Development Administration, Bangkok, Thailand

Abstract

Addiction to social media has now become a problem that societies are concerned with. The aim of the present study is to investigate the impacts that social media addiction has on mindfulness and choice of coping strategy, as well as to explore the consequences on emotional exhaustion. The survey data were collected from 211 employees in 13 enterprises in Thailand. Results from partial least square structural equation modelling revealed that people who are highly addicted to social media tended to have lower mindfulness and tended to use emotion-focused cop- ing to deal with stress. Lack of mindfulness and the decision to use emotion-coping strategy are also subsequently associated with higher emotional exhaustion. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Received 8 October 2014; Revised 19 February 2015; Accepted 20 February 2015

Keywords

social media; addiction; mindfulness; coping; emotional exhaustion

*Correspondence

Peerayuth Charoensukmongkol, International College, National Institute of Development Administration, 118 Moo3, Sereethai Road,

Klong-Chan, Bangkapi, Bangkok 10240, Thailand. †Email: [email protected]

Published online 30 March 2015 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/smi.2637

Introduction Nowadays, it cannot be denied that social media (such as Facebook) has changed the way people around the world communicate, interact and socialize with one an- other. Social media allow people to get closer than ever before, regardless of where they are in the world. They can also be used as a communication tool to help for- profit and non-profit organizations connect closely with target customers (Kietzmann et al., 2011; Xiang & Gretzel, 2010). Unfortunately, despite the benefits that social media have provided, it is evident that more people, especially teenagers, are becoming addicted to using them (Koc & Gulyagci, 2013). Today, almost everywhere in the world, it is not unusual to see people facing down towards their mobile devices to check their social media while walking or doing any activities. Recently, social media addiction is a problem that has received more concern from society because it was found to cause serious issues to users who are unable to refrain themselves from accessing social media (Karaiskos et al., 2010; Kuss & Griffiths, 2011).

In literature, studies on social media have also become a hot topic, receiving more attention from scholars in various fields (Błachnio et al., 2013; George et al., 2013; Kalpidou et al., 2011; Koc & Gulyagci,

2013; Rosen et al., 2013; Seidman, 2013). Still, research on the impact of social media addiction is an area that lack concrete evidence. Moreover, extant social media research is also scant on the impact of social media in the work context. Thus, the aim of the present study is to investigate the outcomes of social media addiction by focusing on the impact on mind- fulness and choice of coping strategy. In addition, the authors are interested in exploring the consequences of social media addiction on emotional exhaustion. The present study will make an extra contribution to literature in two ways. Firstly, the authors focus on outcome factors that have not been explored in social media research. In particular, mindfulness is selected as the main outcome variable. Because it is unarguable that using social media easily causes dis- traction, this research aims to explore whether social media addiction will negatively influence the mind- fulness quality of individuals. The second contribu- tion that the present research provides is the focus on the impacts of social media that take place in the workplace context. The present study aims to extend previous research by exploring whether social media addiction affects emotional exhaustion. Because many enterprises nowadays are more concerned about

using social media during work, results from this study can serve as a guideline for organizations to plan their policy regarding the use of social media at work.

Literature review

Social media addiction

To date, research on the impact of using social media has shown mixed findings. While some studies found that using social media can provide benefit to users, a body of research revealed its negative impacts (Rosen et al., 2013). Recently, addiction to social media is the issue that has received high concerns in society because people nowadays can have more frequent access to so- cial media from portable devices, such as computer tablets or cellular phones, compared with in the past. In particular, Karaiskos et al. (2010) considered social media addiction as an urge-driven disorder with a strong compulsive component.

At the present time, research focusing on social media addiction is still scant (Griffiths, Kuss, & Demetrovics, 2014). For the causes of social media addiction, e.g. Koc and Gulyagci (2013) collected data from student samples and found that Facebook addiction was explained by fac- tors such as weekly time commitment, social motives, se- vere depression, and anxiety and insomnia; however, they did not find any relationship with demographic variables. A few studies also explore the outcomes of social media addiction. For example, Rosen et al. (2013) found that fre- quent access to Facebook is associated with clinical symp- toms of psychiatric disorders. Other scholars also found that overusing social media can impair interpersonal skills and jeopardize the quality of relationships that people de- velop with others (Nyland et al., 2007; Tokunaga, 2011) and also reduce social self-esteem (Valkenburg et al., 2006). Considering the limited findings about the im- pacts of social media addiction, the aim of the present re- search is to investigate its effect on mindfulness and choice of coping strategy, all of which are factors that are left unexplored in the literature.

Effect of social media addiction on mindfulness

Mindfulness is defined as ‘bring[ing] one’s complete attention to the experiences occurring in the present moment, in a non-judgmental or accepting way’ (Baer et al., 2006, p. 27). Although the concept of mindfulness originates from the meditation practice in Buddhism, it is regarded as a universal quality of attention (Jacobs & Blustein, 2008). In this regard, mindfulness also reflects the ability of individuals to focus their attention on any activity that they are performing and not be easily distracted by other things (Kabat-Zinn, 1990). The benefit of mindfulness is a topic that has gained more attention in research over the past few years. Studies found that mindfulness can lead to psychological well-being, enhancing focus and mental clarity (Brown & Ryan, 2003), lowering stress

and depression (Broderick, 2005), and improving quality of life (Christopher & Gilbert, 2010). Mindful- ness was also found as a mental quality that enhances work-related outcomes (Gordon et al., 2014).

Specifically, this research argues that social media addiction can lead to lower mindfulness. The rationale behind this linkage is that when people are addicted to social media, their ability to be mindful to what they are doing in the present tends to be impaired because of the distraction caused by the urge to access social media. Those who are addicted to social media will be anxious if they cannot constantly check or update their status in social media sites (Andreassen et al., 2012). Thus, they may find that it is difficult for them to focus their attention on other activities without thinking about things that they want to do in social media. In fact, the distraction caused by social media usage is a phenomenon that can easily be seen in the society nowadays. For example, people who use social media while they are walking or performing other activities are unable to pay attention to what they are doing. In addition, Rosen et al. (2013) suggested that graphical user interface, such as multi-window computer envi- ronments or multi-app smartphone screens, can inevi- tably require individuals to multitask when using social media. This multitasking nature of using social media causes individuals to shift their attention quickly from one communication screen to another (Rosen et al., 2013). As a result, this behaviour can prevent them from being attentive to a single object and subsequently lowers their mindfulness quality. Thus, the following hypothesis is presented:

Hypothesis 1: Social media addiction negatively associ- ates with mindfulness.

Effect of social media addiction on coping

Lazarus and Folkman (1984) defined coping as an individual’s response to stressful situations involving important, potentially negative, consequences. The the- ory suggested that when encountering stress, individ- uals tend to choose between problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping to help them alleviate psychological tension. The former refers to the ten- dency to take action to alter the source of a problem, whereas the latter refers to the tendency to reduce or eliminate emotional distress associated with a problem (Baker & Berenbaum, 2011). Although the objective of both types of coping is to help individuals reduce stress perception (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984), research has found that problem-focused coping is more likely to produce positive outcomes because it allows people to completely eliminate the source of stress (Hsieh et al., 2012; Lewin & Sager, 2008). On the other hand, emotion-focused coping is regarded as maladaptive coping because it only allows individuals to divert their attention from stress temporarily, but in the long term,

Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol

it can cause individuals to experience more stress as the same problem resurfaces (Chang, 2012).

In fact, studies have found that people tended to access social media like Facebook as a buffer against stress. For example, a study by George et al. (2013) re- ported a case of medical students who used Facebook for stress management. Lazarus and Folkman (1984) found that people relied on friends on Facebook as so- cial resources to cope with stress. Also, Seidman (2013) found that people with obsessive–compulsive personal- ities tended to be those who frequently access Facebook in order to help themselves reduce anxiety. However, there is no study that investigates whether social media usage behaviour might predict choices of stress coping. Here, this research argues that addiction to social media can affect the coping choice that people select when they encounter stressors. Specifically, the authors propose that people who are addicted to social media are more likely to select emotion-focused coping rather than problem-focused coping. In other words, they tend to choose a coping style that allows them to avoid a problem rather than trying to deal with it. This argu- ment can be supported by a study by Seidman (2013) that found that social media use intensity tended to as- sociate positively with neuroticism, which is a trait that makes people perceive ordinary situations as threaten- ing and minor frustrations as causing hopelessness (Karaiskos et al., 2010). Research has found a strong connection between neuroticism as a trait and the tendency of people to choose emotion-focused coping rather problem-focused coping (Andreassen et al., 2012; Koc & Gulyagci, 2013). As a result, it can be ex- pected that when encountering stressful experiences, people addicted to social media are more likely to rely on it to help distract them from the problems they face rather than trying to understand how to solve them. Therefore, the following hypotheses are presented:

Hypothesis 2: People who are addicted to social media will be less likely to use problem-focused coping. Hypothesis 3: People who are addicted to social media will be more likely to use emotion-focused.

In addition to focusing on the direct effect of social media addiction on coping choice, this research argues that its impact can be mediated by the level of mindful- ness quality. In the literature, studies have shown that mindfulness can influence coping strategies. For exam- ple, Gordon et al. (2014) reported that people with a high level of mindfulness tended to engage more in problem analysis and plan rehearsal and to engage less in stagnant deliberation, outcome fantasy and other unhealthy efforts to escape or avoid thoughts and emo- tions. A study by Charoensukmongkol (2014a) using employee samples found that people who regularly per- formed mindfulness training tended to choose problem-focused coping rather than emotion-focused coping when faced with work stress. Rosen et al. (2013) investigated the role of mindfulness on coping

with stressful experiences in college students and found that mindful individuals were less likely to use avoid- ance coping strategies. Based on the earlier findings, the present study expects that people addicted to social media are more likely to use emotion-focused coping rather than problem-focused coping, particularly due to their lack of ability or lack of willingness to focus on the problem they are experiencing and to contem- plate on what they can do to deal with it. Therefore, the following hypotheses are presented:

Hypothesis 4: People who have high levels of mindful- ness will be more likely to use problem-focused coping. Hypothesis 5: People who have high levels of mindful- ness will be less likely to use emotion-focused coping.

Consequence on emotional exhaustion

In addition to the impact of social media addiction on mindfulness and coping choice, this research is interested in exploring the consequence of social media addiction on emotional exhaustion. Emotional exhaus- tion is the state of depletion and fatigue, which is con- sidered a core component of burnout (Kuss & Griffiths, 2011). Generally, it causes employees to feel a lack of energy and reduces their motivation to work for the organization (Nyland et al., 2007). Emotional exhaus- tion is a problem that organizations are concerned of because it has been found to produce negative job outcomes and to lead to mental and physical illnesses (Tokunaga, 2011).

In this research, the authors propose that social me- dia addiction can be associated with emotional exhaus- tion. However, instead of a direct relationship, we argue that the positive effect of social media addiction can be mediated by the level of mindfulness. In other words, the lack of mindfulness, which happens as a result of social media addiction, will cause people to experience emotional exhaustion at work. Generally, emotional exhaustion is considered a cognitive process that happens when individuals perceive that they are unable to deal with job demands and stressful situa- tions in the workplace (Baker & Berenbaum, 2011). Charoensukmongkol (2014a) suggested that mindful- ness helps people become aware of their thoughts and feelings and maintain a non-judgmental attitude towards what they are experiencing. Jacobs and Blustein (2008) reported that mindfulness training could effectively reduce the anxiety experienced by employed workers who face a high degree of employ- ment uncertainty. Thus, by being attentive to one’s thoughts and feelings without reacting upon them, in- dividuals are able to easily let go of any negative thought and feeling that they are experiencing and be less affected by it. In research, Broderick (2005) found that mindfulness allowed people to reduce their negative mood. The experiment by Valkenburg et al. (2006) also provided evidence that employees who

K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping

participated in a self-training mindfulness intervention tended to report lower emotional exhaustion than the control group that did not participate in the intervention. Therefore, these hypotheses are presented as follows:

Hypothesis 6: Mindfulness negatively relates to emo- tional exhaustion Hypothesis 7: Problem-focused coping negatively relates to emotional exhaustion. Hypothesis 8: Emotion-focused coping positively relates to emotional exhaustion.

Methods

Samples and data collection procedure

The sampling frame of this research includes em- ployees from 13 companies in Bangkok, Thailand. These companies are from various types of businesses —including electrical appliance, nutrition, state enter- prise, department store, telecommunication, informa- tion technology, agriculture and airline. The managers of these companies were contacted in advance by one of the authors and were persuaded to allow their employees to participate in the data collection. After the managers agreed to participate, they were asked to inform the researcher about the number of employees they have. In total, 279 surveys were distributed to these companies. Participants had 30 days to complete the questionnaires. At the end of the data collection period, 211 completely filled surveys were returned back, yielding a 76% response rate. Demographic char- acteristics and work-related information of samples are summarized in Tables I and II.

Measures

Social media addiction was measured using the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale developed by Andreassen et al. (2012). For the purpose of the present study, the questions were modified by replacing the word ‘Facebook’ with ‘social media’. Sample items include ‘You spend a lot of time thinking about social media or planning the use of social media’ and ‘You use social media so much that it has had a negative impact on your job/studies’. They were scored on a five-point fre- quency scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).

Mindfulness was measured using the Mindfulness Attention and Awareness Scale developed by Brown and Ryan (2003). The scale consists of 15 questions. Sample items include ‘I could be experiencing an

emotion and not be conscious of it until sometime later’ and ‘I break or spill things because of carelessness, not paying attention, or thinking of something else’. They were scored on a five-point frequency scale, ranging from 1 (almost always) to 5 (almost never), thereby making the low score represent lack of mindfulness.

Coping strategies were measured using the scale developed by Lewin and Sager (2008), which was also adapted from Lazarus and Folkman (1984). Respon- dents were asked how often they have used the follow- ing coping methods when experiencing stress at work. Problem-focused coping consists of six items. Sample items include ‘I make a plan and follow it’ and ‘I come up with several alternative solutions for the problem’. Emotion-focused coping consists of six items. Sample items include ‘I have fantasies about how things will work out’ and ‘I hope a miracle will happen’. Questions were scored on a five-point frequency scale, ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (always).

Emotional exhaustion was measured using the Maslach Burnout Inventory, developed by Maslach et al. (1996). Sample items include ‘I feel emotionally drained from my work’ and ‘I feel used up at the end of the workday’. All items were scored on a five-point rating scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).

In addition to the main independent variable, this study controlled for organizational factors and demo- graphic factors that can influence the endogenous variables. Control variables consist of job demands, job position, working class, age, gender and educa- tional level. For job demand, the authors used the scale developed by Karasek et al. (1998), which contains five items that represent the demanding aspects of

Table I. Demographic characteristics of the participants—mean and standard deviation (SD)

Characteristic Mean SD

Age (in year) 31.56 7.09

Job tenure (in years) 5.29 5.69

Table II. Demographic characteristics of the participants—frequency distribution

Characteristic Frequency %

Gender

Male 96 45

Female 107 50

Missing data 8 5

Educational level

Primary school 1 0.5

Secondary school 6 3

Vocational certificate 1 0.5

High vocational certificate 21 10

Diploma 4 2

Bachelor degree 134 63

Master degree 33 15

Doctoral degree 1 0.5

Missing data 10 5.5

Type of organization

Manufacturing 42 20

Service 62 30

Health care 107 50

Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol

jobs (e.g. work hard and work fast). They were scored on a five-point rating scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Working class was measured as a dummy variable (blue-collar worker = 0 and white-collar worker = 1). Job position was measured using an ordinal scale. Age was measured in years. Gender was measured by a dummy variable (female = 0 and male = 1). Educational level was mea- sured using an ordinal scale.

Statistical analysis

Partial least squares (PLS) structural equation model- ling was used as a statistical technique to analyse the data. PLS is suitable for the analysis because it allows the use of single-item and multiple-item measurement in survey research. These features are suitable for the model proposed in this study, which includes key variables that are reflective constructs. Moreover, PLS offers more flexibility over other structural equation

modelling techniques because it allows smaller sample size, and it does not require data to be normally distrib- uted. PLS analysis was performed in WarpPLS Version 3.0, developed by Kock (2012).

Results Descriptive statistics of main exogenous and endogenous variables in the model are reported in Table III. All variables were standardized automatically by WarpPLS before PLS estimation. Standardized data range from �4 to 4, withmeans equal to 0 and standard errors equal to 1.

Before estimating the PLS model, a series of analyses was performed. Firstly, a convergent validity test was conducted using factor loading. Hair et al. (2009) sug- gested that factor loadings should be greater than 0.5. The factor loadings of all concepts are greater than 0.5 except for two items that belong to mindfulness. Thus, two items that had low loadings were removed. Then a discriminant validity test was conducted, considering the average variance extracted (AVE) of the construct. Fornell and Larcker (1981) suggested that the square root of the AVE of the construct must be greater than other correlations involved in that construct. Table IV reports correlations among all the variables as well as the square root of the AVEs. Overall, the results from the AVE analysis satisfied this condition. Next, a reli- ability analysis was performed using Cronbach’s alpha (α) coefficient and the composite reliability coefficient. The results in Table IV show that all coefficients exceed 0.7. Finally, all model fit indices also confirmed goodness of fit of the data (average path coefficient (APC)=0.112; p< 0.001, average r-squared (ARS)=0.205; p< 0.001, average full collinearity (AVIF)= 1.147).

In order to check for the possible issue of multicollinearity, the variance inflation factor (VIF)

Table III. Descriptive statistics of main exogenous and endogenous variables in the model

Variable Max Min Skewness Kurtosis

SMA 2.441 �1.616 0.13 �0.893 MFN 2.611 �2.371 0.261 �0.256 EX 2.623 �2.218 0.048 �0.018 PFC 2.079 �4.925 �1.456 4.913 EFC 2.5 �2.228 0.15 �0.378 SMA: social media addiction;MFN:mindfulness; EX: emotional exhaus-

tion; PFC: problem-focused coping; EFC: emotion-focused coping.

All variables are standardized.

Standardized data range from �4 to 4, with means equal to 0 and standard errors equal to 1.

Table IV. Correlation among variables and square root of average variance extracted

Composite reliability

coefficients

Cronbach’s alpha

coefficients SMA MFN EX PFC EFC AGE GEN EDU JPOS WC JDM

SMA 0.885 0.848 (0.725)

MFN 0.901 0.881 0.355** (0.629)

EX 0.922 0.893 0.236** 0.405** (0.838)

PFC 0.876 0.829 �0.062 �0.001 �0.019 (0.736) EFC 0.866 814 0.435** 0.458** 0.363**�0.014 (0.722) AGE — — �0.027 �0.009 �0.109 0.075 0.008 (1) GEN — — �0.217**�0.059 �0.193**�0.153* �0.175* 0.055 (1) EDU — — �0.104 �0.057 �0.074 0.252**�0.02 �0.03 �0.079 (1) JPOS — — 0.023 0.101 �0.009 �0.124 0.104 �0.323**�0.02 �0.179** (1) WC — — 0.021 0 0.118 0.013 0.073 0.053 0.111�0.027 �0.028 (1) JDM 0.871 0.815 0.039 0.116 0.345** 0.033 0.121 0.086 �0.071�0.044 �0.001 0.151* (0.759) SMA: social media addiction; MFN: mindfulness; EX: emotional exhaustion; PFC: problem-focused coping; EFC: emotion-focused coping; AGE:

age; GEN: gender dummy variable (male = 1); EDU: education; JPOS: job position; WC: working class (white collar = 1); JDM: job demands.

Spearman rank correlation coefficients are reported.

Square roots of average variance extracted of latent variables are shown in the parentheses.

**p< 0.01.

*p< 0.05.

K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping

analysis was performed. This research employed a full VIF test, which offers more advantages than a tradi- tional VIF test because it allows lateral and horizontal collinearity to be assessed simultaneously (Kock, 2012). Results indicated that all full VIF indicators are less than 3.3, which is the satisfactory level as suggested by Petter et al. (2007). A full VIF analysis was also suggested by Kock and Lynn (2012) as the indicator to evaluate the common method bias (CMB) in PLS analysis. They suggested that CMB can be a serious is- sue if the full VIF value is higher than 3.3. Since all full VIF indicators are lower than this threshold, CMB may not be a serious issue in the analysis. Finally, the result from a Harman’s one-factor test does not indicate that one-factor confirmatory factor analysis model fits the data well (χ2 = 2866.49; degrees of freedom=702; p< 0.001). These findings, overall, alleviate a concern about CMB in the analysis.

Results from the PLS analysis are presented in Figure 1. The standardized coefficient and t-values were calculated using a bootstrap resampling technique. This study used a resampling procedure with 100 subsam- ples, as recommended by Efron et al. (2004).

Hypothesis 1 predicted a negative relationship be- tween social media addiction and mindfulness. The re- sult shows that their relationship is negative and highly significant (β=�0.356, p< 0.001). Thus, hypothesis 1 is strongly supported.

Hypothesis 2 predicted a negative relationship between social media addiction and problem-focused coping. Although the result shows a negative relationship be- tween them, it is not statistically significant (β= .084, p=0.112). Thus, hypothesis 2 is not supported.

Hypothesis 3 predicted a positive relationship be- tween social media addiction and emotion-focused coping. The result shows that their relationship is pos- itive and highly significant (β=0.297, p< 0.001). Thus, hypothesis 3 is strongly supported.

Hypothesis 4 predicted a positive relationship between mindfulness and problem-focused coping. The result shows that their relationship is negative; however, it is not statistically significant (β=�0.037, p=0.281). Therefore, hypothesis 4 is not supported.

Hypothesis 5 predicted a negative relationship between mindfulness and emotion-focused coping. The result shows that their relationship is negative and highly significant (β=�0.335, p< 0.001). Therefore, hypothesis 5 is strongly supported.

Hypothesis 6 predicted a negative relationship between mindfulness and emotional exhaustion. The result indicates that their relationship is negative and highly significant (β=�0.29, p< 0.001). Therefore, hy- pothesis 6 is strongly supported.

Hypothesis 7 predicted a negative relationship between problem-focused coping and emotional exhaustion, whereas hypothesis 8 predicted a positive relationship between emotion-focused coping and emotional exhaustion. The results show that the link between problem-focused coping and emotional ex- haustion is negative (β=�0.034, p=0.296), while the link between emotion-focused coping and emotional exhaustion is positive (β=0.18, p=0.005). However, only the link between emotion-focused coping and emotional exhaustion is statistically significant. Thus, hypothesis 8 is supported but not hypothesis 7.

Discussion The main objective of this research is to explore the im- pacts of social media addiction on mindfulness and choice of coping strategies as well as to investigate its consequences on emotional exhaustion. Firstly, results from PLS analysis strongly confirmed that people with high addiction to social media tended to have lower mindfulness than those with lower addiction. In addi- tion, statistical evidence strongly indicated that people

Figure 1 Partial least squares results

Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol

who are addicted to social media tended to choose emotion-focused coping to deal with stress rather than choosing problem-focused coping. However, no evi- dence was found for the linkage between social media ad- diction and problem-focused coping. In particular, evidence about the negative impact of social media ad- diction on mindfulness is in line with what is happening in our society nowadays, wherein people who are unable to control their behaviour towards using social media are found to have more difficulty focusing on or paying close attention to their jobs or other activities because they cannot control their urge to use social media all the time. The influence of social media addiction on the decision to use emotion-focused coping rather than problem- focused coping is also consistent with research suggesting that some people tended to rely on social media access to alleviate stress (George et al., 2013; Seidman, 2013).

However, the impacts of social media addiction on the level of mindfulness and the coping strategy that individuals selected can be a serious issue for an organi- zation, as further analysis revealed that these two factors subsequently affected emotional exhaustion. Lack of mindfulness also indirectly influenced emo- tional exhaustion through the choice of emotion- focused coping. This finding is consistent with extant research that suggests that emotion-focused coping or avoidance coping is a dysfunctional coping strategy (Carver & Connor-Smith, 2010; Chang, 2012; Parker et al., 2012). In this regard, those who are addicted to so- cial media may spend most of their time on their social media activities in order to help them forget about the problem that they are experiencing instead of trying to think about how to face the said problem. Importantly, lack of mindfulness caused by compulsion to use social media could be the factor that explains this linkage. This finding is in line with research about the necessity of mindfulness in helping people cope effectively with stress (Baer et al., 2006; Charoensukmongkol, 2014a). Without the ability of people to be mindful of their own thoughts and actions, it will be very difficult for them to think clearly and rationally about how to deal with difficulties that they encounter (Christopher & Gilbert, 2010; Jacobs & Blustein, 2008).

However, there are several limitations in this research that need to be considered. Firstly, this research used cross-sectional data for the analysis, thereby making the di- rection of causality difficult to be inferred. Therefore, future studies that employ longitudinal data are required to con- firm the direction of causality. Secondly, this research col- lected data from a small number of enterprises, which limits the generalizability of the findings. Future research will need to cover a larger number of firms for investigation.

But despite some research limitations, results from this study provide significant contribution to social me- dia research. Importantly, the authors have provided additional evidence to the literature on the impact of social media addiction, which is an area that still lacks empirical investigation at the present time. Specifically,

this research focuses on the impact of social media ad- diction on mindfulness and coping strategy, which are factors that were left unexplored. In addition, by focus- ing on employee samples and workplace outcomes, this research is able to extend the context of social media research to explore its impact in the workplace environment. The overall results provide additional support to extant studies that found the negative conse- quences of social media usage (Kalpidou et al., 2011; Karaiskos et al., 2010; Rosen et al., 2013). Although studies by Charoensukmongkol (2014b) and Moqbel et al. (2013) found evidence of the positive contribu- tion of social media use intensity on job performance, the present research has provided findings that, on the contrary, social media addiction could negatively affect job performance. While some scholars have sug- gested that social media could be used as a tool to help people reduce stress (George et al., 2013; Seidman, 2013), it is important to realize that it could inevitably lead to detrimental outcomes if people cannot control themselves from overusing it.

Conclusion Social media has become a key integral part of people’s life in today’s digital age. Although social media provides significant benefits in many aspects, it is important to understand the negative impacts that it causes as well. Because people nowadays, especially teenagers, are more prone to social media addiction, it is important for soci- eties to be concerned more about behaviour towards so- cial media access. In this research, the authors were interested in the effect of social addiction on mindful- ness and coping strategy, as well as its consequence on emotional exhaustion and job performance. Overall, we have found evidence of the negative impact that so- cial media addiction has on these outcomes.

Lastly, this research provides practical solutions for organizations concerning some of the negative effects of social media. Because of the negative impacts that social media addiction might cause to the well-being and job outcomes of employees, it is important for companies to consider policies to help prevent and overcome this problem in the workplace. For example, a company may provide counselling services to help employees cope with the related problems they experi- ence at work. This counselling service might help lower employees’ reliance on social media as a dysfunctional form of coping because, rather than posting such problems on social media, it creates the opportunity for employees to openly discuss concerns about their problems and difficulties so that employees can receive advice and support to help them effectively overcome these problems in constructive ways. In addition to a counselling service, a company may provide some rec- reational activities or trainings to lessen the problem of addiction to social media in employees. In particular, meditation training might be an effective intervention for this objective, not only because research shows that

K. Sriwilai and P. Charoensukmongkol Social Media Addiction, Mindfulness and Coping

it helps individuals overcome addictive behaviours (Shonin et al., 2014), but it also prevents individuals from engaging in other dysfunctional means of coping (Charoensukmongkol, 2014a).

Conflicts of interest

The authors have declared that they have no conflict of interest.

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