Cross-national validation of the social media disorder scale: findings from adolescents from 44 countries

Background and aims: There is currently no cross-national validation of a scale that measures problematic social media use (SMU). The present study investigated and compared the psychometric properties of the social media disorder (SMD) scale among young adolescents from different countries. Design: Validation study. Setting and participants: Data came from 222 532 adolescents from 44 countries participating in the health behaviour in school-aged children (HBSC) survey (2017/2018). The HBSC survey was conducted in the European region and Canada. Participants were on average aged 13.54 years (standard deviation = 1.63) and 51.24% were girls. Measurement: Problematic SMU was measured using th…