THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND ITS IMPLICATIONS TO THE PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING OF YOUNG ADOLESCENTS: BASIS FOR ENHANCEMENT OF THE GUIDANCE PROGRAM

In recent years, many parents, advocates, and policymakers have expressed concern regarding the potential negative impact of social media use. This study discussed the use of social media and the implications to the psychological well-being of young adolescents. The study utilizes a descriptive research design through a descriptive correlational study. The purpose of this design is to describe how one variable is related to or associated with another variable. The researcher looks into how young adolescents use social media and its implications to their psychological wellbeing as a basis for a guidance program. The participants of this study are 400 students from grades 7 to 10 in a college in the CALABARZON region. Stratified random sampling was used as a sampling technique to identify the number of respondents. Majority of the respondents of this study are female at 63%. Based on their number of friends, most of them have 500 - 1000 number of friends on their social networking sites. In terms of their social media use, they spend 2-3 hours and 4-6 hours of social media use. They visit Facebook and YouTube mostly to talk to their friends. In addition, they browse the news feed as an activity on social media use. Based on Ryffy?s Psychological Well-Being Scale, it shows that they have slight well-being in terms of autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, positive relations, purpose in life and self-acceptance. Based on the perceived self-esteem level according to Rosenberg, it shows that they have a slightly high self-esteem. Nevertheless, there is no significant correlation between the psychological well-being and the self-esteem of the respondents.