The Correlation between Social Media Addiction and Life Satisfaction Among University Students

The aim of this study is to compare Social Media (SM) addicts and non-addicts in life satisfaction among university students. In particular, it seeks to verify the extent to which there is a statistically significant relationship between the addiction of SM among university students and their life satisfaction with a focus on the variables of gender, specialization and academic level. Omani university students are among the groups that use and are affected by SM, and their life satisfaction is affected by this use, which is worthy of research. The participants consisted of 481 (264 female, 217 male) university students. SM Addiction Scale-Adult Form (Andreassen, et al, 2014) and Life Satisfaction Scale (ESWLS) constructed by Alfonso et al (1996) were used in the data collection process. The results indicated that there is a negative relationship between life satisfaction and SM addiction. There are statistically significant differences between the addicts and non-addicts' students in terms of life satisfaction in favor of the non-addicts. Statistically significant differences also are found between male and female; science and humanities; senior and freshmen levels in terms of SM addiction and life satisfaction. The study puts conclusions and recommendations in light of the above results.