Author(s) :

Madison Park, Chelsea Harmon.

Volume/Issue :

Abstract :

The rapid rise of social media use among adolescents has raised concerns for parents and researchers about its addictive potential and detrimental mental health consequences, particularly for individuals with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), a population characterized by reward dysregulation and impaired impulse control. This literature review examines the neurobiological vulnerabilities underlying ADHD and explains how these likely increase the susceptibility to social media addiction, as well as how addictive social media may in turn exacerbate ADHD symptomology, through dysregulated dopaminergic reward pathways and deficits in behavioral inhibition. The review proposes a bidirectional relationship between ADHD and social media addiction, arguing that social media platforms both exploit and exacerbate ADHD-related vulnerabilities to result in negative mental health outcomes. To illustrate this interaction, specific design features of Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, and TikTok are considered to demonstrate how distinct and overlapping mechanisms of reinforcement, urgency, and personalization promote compulsive engagement with social media platforms for adolescents with ADHD diagnoses. Finally, the review synthesizes evidence linking the proposed bidirectional relationship between ADHD and social media addiction to adverse mental health outcomes, including anxiety, depression, and sleep disturbances among adolescents. Taken together, interpreting the growing body of research in this way suggests that reward dysregulation and impulse control underline the bidirectional relationship between ADHD and social media addiction, resulting in increased risk for poor mental health. Despite limitations of existing research, the proposed integrated bidirectional framework can help to guide future research, clinical interventions, and the development of social media platforms to better support adolescent mental health, especially among neurodivergent populations.