A Look into the Relationship Between Online Communities and Mental Health

Maricella Ragudos

BIO A 423: Social Networks and Health, Spring 2023

Dr. Steven Goodreau

1 June 2023
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The reach of the digital world appears to expand more almost every day. Since the internet’s

inception, it’s grown from a tool accessible from a family computer to a near necessity for daily

life carried around in pockets and purses at all times. The COVID-19 pandemic especially

highlighted the crucial role the internet plays in our culture as schools, jobs, and community events

were digitized and many jobs have remained remote. As people have growing health concerns

about utilizing physical public spaces, I was curious about how supportive online communities

could be. Through my literature review and survey design and implementation, I wondered: what

are the differences in perceived social support and its impact on mental health between online and

in-person friendships among college and high school students aged 15-25?

While the link between screen time/social media usage and mental health isn’t a new

research topic, I was curious about whether the specific purpose of being involved with an online

community would be any different. From 2002-2003, researchers from Tsinghua University in

Beijing conducted a sample survey of randomly selected households in Hong Kong, Beijing,

Taipei, and Wuhan, China to test their hypothesis that interpersonal communication through

“Internet Communication Technologies” such as email, instant messaging, or chatrooms could

improve individuals’ quality of life in a manner comparable to face-to-face communication (Lee,

et al. 2011, 375, 380). They measured the internet use for interpersonal communication of very

household member older than age 15 and surveyed the individuals regarding their life satisfaction

(380). Researchers found that “Internet use for interpersonal communication cannot predict quality

of life, while face-to-face interaction with friends and family members can” (383). Additionally,

they found that digital interpersonal communication had a slightly negative relationship with

reported quality of life, while increased face-to-face communication had a positive impact (383).

Further regression showed that those with less existing social support or face-to-face interactions
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were less likely to use the internet for interpersonal communication, which removes the potential

for the confounding variable that maybe a certain kind of person who is less satisfied with their

life that uses the internet more (385). The authors conclude that face-to-face interactions allow

people to convey emotions and warmth nonverbally in a way that digital communication can’t

replicate (386).

Almost ten years after the first survey, researchers in information systems and technology

further examined online interpersonal communication within the context of online communities,

which they defined as places to “provide the general public with useful information, emotional

support, venues for political and social discussion, and ways to maintain their social networks and

meet new people” (Ren, et al. 2012, 842).” However, in most online communities, they observed

that people didn’t engage much at all and rarely for extended periods of time (842). This introduces

both the main appeal and the main challenge of digital communities: people pick up and drop off

as they feel like it. While it’s convenient, it’s counteractive to community development.

However, researchers post-pandemic seem to have a more optimistic view of online

communities. In chapter 1 of her book Should You Believe Wikipedia?, Dr. Bruckman states that

“different sorts of community provide diverse kinds of value to their members” and that while

cultural perceptions of community might generate images of small towns or religious organizations

most frequently in an American audience, online communities simply take a different form to

accomplish a similar purpose (Bruckman 2022, 11). Further, she proposes that the Internet can act

as a third place— a term coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg that refers to a neutral location that

is neither work nor home for “unplanned, unscheduled, unorganized, and unstructured” yet

pleasant social activity (19). Some examples of physical third places might be libraries, coffee

shops, bars, or gyms. While physical spaces are important, online spaces share similar
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characteristics— the site design helps to communicate its intended use, it’s accessible, contains

unplanned activity, attracts people of varying backgrounds, regular users set the social norms and

culture, and people may even take on social roles (22-23). Similarly, qualitative research that

began during the COVID-19 pandemic and continued into 2022 frames community engagement

and social activity as something that is “more or less digital,” arguing that with how integrated

technology is in our lives currently, there is no such thing as fully “offline” (Tucker, Easton and

Prestwood 2023, 668).

With this research in mind, I designed my survey hoping to learn more about how college

and high school students are (or aren’t) utilizing online communities. Respondents were asked to

rank their overall mental health and wellbeing on a scale from 1-6, and then asked a series of

questions aiming to understand how much perceived social support they may have in person,

including that they feel connected to a community, how easy it is to connect with members of that

community in-person, and whether they feel emotionally supported. Participants were then asked

if they are involved in any online communities, how active they are, and whether they feel

emotionally supported by the online community. Regarding both in-person and digital

communities, I was most interested to find the results of the question “Is there someone [in your

life/in an online community] that you would feel comfortable asking for mental or emotional

support?”

To gain participation for the survey, I planned to post it on UW reddit channels, the survey

channel mentioned in class, the “Class of 2025” Snapchat story, and to announce it in another class.

When I realized that I wanted the survey to focus on college students specifically, I emailed it to

our class using the provided email list on Canvas, announced it in another class group chat, posted

it to the “Class of 2025” Snapchat story, and then also to the reddit channels r/udub and
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r/uwashington. I also posted on my personal social media account to ask for participation. I mostly

stuck to my implementation plan, with the choice not to post it to the survey channel because I

didn’t think it targeted the population I was interested in as well as the other methods.

To begin the data cleaning process, I eliminated the question that asked participants to rank

how easy it was to connect with their online community. Upon review, even though the question

tells participants to rank on a scale from 1 to 6, I mistakenly left the ranking scale from 1 to 5.

Consequently, I’m unsure how accurate the data could be considered. In cleaning participant

responses, I initially wasn’t sure that I would exclude any survey responses based on age, but upon

further thought I decided to exclude responses from respondents who selected that they were aged

“30-35” or “older than 35” for the reason that while they may have been a university student during

the height of the pandemic, it didn’t take place at a formative period of development since they

were already adults. I also deleted two participants who answered that they were not involved in

any online communities but answered the questions about online communities, for I think they

may have misunderstood the questions and I’m unsure if the data they provided would be helpful.

This left me with 27 participant responses to analyze. One participant was in the 15-18 age range,

one was in the 24-29 age range, and the rest were aged 19-24. The overwhelming number of

respondents were cisgender women, although two respondents were nonbinary/non-conforming

and four were cisgender men.

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Of the respondents, nearly 60%

(16/27) were involved in an online

community; 6 were involved in one, and ten

were involved in more than one (represented

in the histogram by numerical values 0, 1,

and 2). On a scale from 1 to 6, where one

was unwell or unhealthy and 6 was very well

or very healthy, participants reported an average mental health score of 3.89, and an average overall

wellbeing score of 4.037. There was no significant difference in mental health and wellbeing scores

between genders. I was happy to see that, except for one person who selected “prefer not to

answer,” each participant had one or more persons in their life that they would feel comfortable

asking for emotional or mental health support. 92.59% of participants (25/27) reported being able

to spend time in in-person communities once a week or more. Contrastingly, only 22.22% of

respondents reported being “active” or “very active” in online communities and 89% of

respondents (24/27) stated that they would not feel comfortable asking for the same support of

anyone in an online community.

Upon viewing the results, I was surprised to find that real-life community engagement

didn’t seem to have a strong correlation on online community involvement. In fact, the two

respondents who stated they would feel comfortable seeking online support also chose the highest

rankings for their own mental health, wellbeing, and level of perceived emotional support from

their in-person communities. To confirm, I ran a linear regression on emotional support from online

communities and from in-person communities, but the results were statistically insignificant,

returning a p-value of 0.89. While this was shocking based on my own perceptions and biases, this
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echoes the earlier study on online interpersonal communication. So instead, I began to examine

what made people feel emotionally supported by their online communities. I ran a linear regression

on level of activity in online communities and feelings of emotional support from one’s online

community, and it returned a p-value of

0.028. While this is a weak positive

correlation, it was one of the only positive

correlations I was able to pull from the data.

These results make sense, especially

comparing the role of a digital community

to a physical one: as the people and the

social roles in a community become more

familiar, it makes sense that individuals would feel more comfortable and supported within those

spaces. However, there was a slight negative correlation between online community involvement

in mental health. The correlation was very slight, though, with a p-value of 0.38.

Regarding in-person communities,

connection to a network of people with

whom the individual shared “common

interests, hobbies, goals, or identities” was

an important predictor of mental health

and of perceived emotional support within

the survey. However, this is something

we’ve covered since the first day of class.

These results in and of themselves weren’t shocking, but I found it curious that people did not
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seem to seek out online community support when they did not feel connected to an in-person

community— to be sure, I ran the linear regression, which returned a p-value of 0.95. There was

no connection.

I was surprised to find that of the large share of participants involved in an online

community, only three would feel comfortable asking someone from an online community for

support. Alongside the number of people without an in-person community to feel strongly

connected to, this may suggest people are still less comfortable with digital community space than

physical community space. I would be curious to find out what online communities people

considered— whether they were spaces in which they were able to see other users face-to-face

through video, hear other users’ voices, or if the communities were things like reddit pages and

discord channels for certain hobbies or interests. Would it make a difference in how connected

people feel, or how likely they would be to reach out for support?

The survey results are, of course, limited by a short amount of time to gather responses, as

well as funding. With more time, I could have increased the number of responses through posting

it onto more platforms, word of mouth, hanging fliers, or even asking people in person. With

funding, I may have been able to offer financial incentives for survey completion or print eye-

catching posters with QR codes, and it’s likely I could have increased the number of respondents.

Regarding survey design, if I were to run this again in the future I would define “online

community” more clearly. Due to the participant data I chose to exclude, it seems a few people

interpreted the phrase to mean digital spaces with people they already know— for example,

organizational group chats— which wasn’t necessarily what I was interested in. I would include

more questions about the type of online communities, and maybe fewer questions about in-person

ones. It seemed that everyone had someone to turn to for help, which is wonderful, but means that
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I could have used that space to find something more significant. I should have also considered that,

surveying college students (a demographic of which I am a part and spend most of my time

among), the question about how often people are able to be in community wasn’t the best use of

space. Most people gave the same response, that they are able to connect with their in-person

communities once per week or more, which I didn’t anticipate, but maybe should have since most

college students are living with friends/roommates, in clubs, academically involved, and otherwise

have more open time to see people with whom they share interests, goals, ideas, and/or identities.

Additionally, I would have loved to hear from a more diverse set of respondents. 77.78%

of participants were cisgender women, which is likely a reflection of my social circle who

completed and helped to distribute my survey. With more time to organize outreach, and maybe

some help from my friends who aren’t women, I think I could have heard from a more diverse

audience.
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Survey link: https://forms.gle/4dHGCNGhYzKevoUh6

Excel Data Cleaning Diary

1. Create a copy of Excel table

2. Rename question categories

a. “What is your age?” —> age

b. “What best fits your gender identity?” —> gender

c. “How would you rank your overall mental health? Please choose a number below

from 1 (Not at all healthy) to 6 (Very healthy).” —> mentalhealth

d. “How would you rank your overall wellbeing? Please choose a number below

from 1 (Unwell) to 6 (Very well).” —> wellbeing

e. “Please choose a number from 1 (Strongly disagree) to 6 (Strongly agree) based

on the statement below: There is a network of people in my life with whom I

share common interests, hobbies, goals, or identities.” —> irl_community

f. “Please choose a number from 1 (Very difficult) to 6 (Very easy) based on the

statement below: It is easy for me to connect with these people in person.” —>

irl_connection

g. “Please choose a number from 1 (Not at all supported) to 6 (Very supported)

based on the statement below: I feel emotionally supported by the people in my

life.” —> irl_emotion

h. “Is there someone in your life you would feel comfortable asking for mental or

emotional support?” —> irl_help

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i. “How often are you able to spend time in communities in-person?” —>

irl_frequency

j. “I am involved in one or more online communities.” —> web_community

k. “How active are you in online communities?” —> web_activity

l. “Please choose a number from 1 (Very difficult) to 6 (Very easy) based on the

statement below: It is easy for me to connect with these people online.” —>

web_connection

m. “Please choose a number from 1 (Not at all supported) to 6 (very supported) based

on the statement below: I feel emotionally supported by my online

community/communities.” —> web_activity

n. “Is there someone in an online community you would feel comfortable asking for

mental or emotional support?” —> web_support

3. Deleted column “Is there anything else you would like to add?” since nobody added to it.

4. Deleted “Older than 35” respondent and “30-35” year old respondents

5. Deleted Participant 18 for suspicious data— She said she was not involved in online

communities but answered all online community questions affirmatively.

6. Deleted Participant 28 for suspicious data— he said he was not involved in online

communities but answered online community questions affirmatively.

7. Deleted “Timestamp” category automatically generated by Google.

8. In web_support, changed “Prefer not to answer” to “No” in those who said they weren’t

involved in online communities.

9. Changed “web_support” responses to 0, 1, 2 where No= 0; 1= Yes, one; and 2= Yes, more

than one
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10. Changed online_communities to 0, 1, 2 where No= 0; 1= Yes, one; and 2= Yes, more than

one

11. Changed web_activity variable to 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 where “I am not involved in any online

community”= 0; “Not very active— I post, comment, or message other users less than

once per week” =1; “Somewhat active— I post, comment, or message other users once

per week” = 2; “Active— I post, comment, or message other users multiple times per

week” =3; and “Very active— I post, comment, or message other users multiple times per

day”=4

12. Deleted column “web_connection” due to error.

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R Script

> setwd("~/Desktop/BIOA423 final")

>View(Online_Community_Involvement_and_Mental_Health_Responses_COPY_Online_Co

mmunity_involvement_)

>communitysurvey <- read.csv(file="Desktop/Online Community Involvement and

Mental Health (Responses) - COPY Online Community involvement .csv", header=

TRUE, stringsAsFactors = FALSE)

> hist(communitysurvey$web_community, xlab="Number of Online Communities",

ylab="Number of Participants", main= "Are you involved in any online

communities?", labels= TRUE,ylim=c(0,12), breaks= 3, col= "lightblue")

> mean(communitysurvey$mentalhealth)

> mean(communitysurvey$wellbeing)

> lm(communitysurvey$irl_emotion ~ communitysurvey$web_emotion.)

> summary(lm(communitysurvey$irl_emotion ~ communitysurvey$web_emotion.))

> lm(communitysurvey$web_emotion. ~ communitysurvey$web_activity)

> activity_emotion <- lm(communitysurvey$web_emotion. ~

communitysurvey$web_activity)

> summary(activity_emotion)

> plot(communitysurvey$web_activity, communitysurvey$web_emotion., main=

"Online Emotional Support Compared to Activity", xlab= "activity, from not

active to very active", ylab= "perceived emotional support from online

community")

> abline(activity_emotion)

> summary(lm(communitysurvey$mentalhealth ~

communitysurvey$web_community))
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> mentalhealth.irl_support <-

summary(lm(communitysurvey$mentalhealth ~

communitysurvey$irl_emotion))

> community_support <- summary(lm(communitysurvey$irl_community

~ communitysurvey$irl_emotion))

> plot(communitysurvey$irl_emotion,

communitysurvey$irl_community, main="Perceived Emotional Support

and Community Connection", xlab= "perceived emotional support",

ylab="level of connection to community")

> abline(community_support)

> lm(communitysurvey$irl_community ~

communitysurvey$web_community)

> summary(lm(communitysurvey$irl_community ~

communitysurvey$web_community))
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Bibliography

Bruckman, Amy S. 2022. “Are Online ‘Communities’ Really Communities?” Chapter. In Should
You Believe Wikipedia?: Online Communities and the Construction of Knowledge, 8–31.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108780704.002.

Lee, Paul S. N., Louis Leung, Venhwei Lo, Chengyu Xiong, and Tingjun Wu. 2011. “Internet
Communication Versus Face-to-Face Interaction in Quality of Life.” Social Indicators
Research 100, no. 3: 375–89. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41476404.

Ren, Yuqing, F. Maxwell Harper, Sara Drenner, Loren Terveen, Sara Kiesler, John Riedl, and
Robert E. Kraut. 2012. “Building Member Attachment in Online Communities: Applying
Theories of Group Identity and Interpersonal Bonds.” MIS Quarterly 36 (3).
MINNEAPOLIS: Management Information Systems Research Center, University of
Minnesota: 841–64. doi:10.2307/41703483.

Tucker, Ian, Katherine Easton, and Rebecca Prestwood. 2023. “Digital Community Assets:
Investigating the Impact of Online Engagement with Arts and Peer Support Groups on
Mental Health During COVID‐19.” Sociology of Health & Illness 45 (3). England: Wiley
Subscription Services, Inc: 666–83. doi:10.1111/1467-9566.13620.