A Scale to Measure Social Media Jealousy

Abstract

As social media continues to grow rapidly throughout the world, researchers and mental health professionals have been keenly observing and recording some of its detrimental effects on the mental and emotional health of its users. In this regard, one of the constructs that has been gaining interest is social media jealousy. However, there is a paucity of standardised tools that accurately measure this construct. To fill this gap, the present research was undertaken as a part of a larger study examining the possible negative effects of social media. The present research has resulted in the development of the 15-item Social Media Jealousy Scale (SMJS-15). It is a single-dimensional scale that has shown strong reliability, convergent validity, as well as evidence of construct validity. The scale has been developed using both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses and can be used to test social media jealousy experienced by users across multiple social media platforms.