Study explores social media's role in mental health during pandemic

New research explores how social media, specifically Twitter (now X), became a vital outlet for mental health discussions as the Covid-19 pandemic unfolded.

University of Auckland researchers Shohil Kishore, Professor David Sundaram and Professor Michael Myers explored the evolving role of Twitter in facilitating mental-health related discourse to show how users' psychological needs shifted across different phases of the crisis.

Despite its often negative reputation, social media provided support and connection during the early stages of the pandemic, says Kishore. His analysis of mental health-related retweets shows a sharp spike in activity in 2020, as people turned to Twitter to fulfil needs that had become hard to meet in real life.

“As lockdowns restricted personal autonomy, people turned online to meet three particular needs related to competence, self-reflection and finding a sense of place.”

Changes in retweeting between 2019 and 2020 reflected users' efforts to regain control, reflect on their changing identities, and find an online ‘home’ where they could express themselves and regain some control over their lives.

“Before the pandemic, people might have gone to the gym, a pub quiz, or to a friend’s place for coffee to maintain their mental wellbeing. When those options disappeared, more individuals shifted to Twitter to connect and discuss mental health,” he says.

Competence – the desire to control one’s environment and achieve meaningful outcomes – was especially evident in how people engaged.

“People were looking for ways to assert control in a world turned upside down,” says Kishore.

Self-reflection, or ‘coming to know the self,’ was another recurring theme. As the pandemic disrupted daily routines, users turned to the platform to reflect on their identities amid the upheaval.

By 2021, as the immediate crisis subsided, mental health-related retweets again diversified. The intense focus on competence, self-reflection and finding a sense of place eased, as users found other ways – both online and offline – to meet those psychological needs, says Kishore.

The study highlights how the pandemic reshaped the drivers of social media engagement and suggests that platforms like X could play a more deliberate role in enabling users during crises.

"While social media isn’t perfect, it can be a valuable tool for people who are seeking connection, anonymity and a place to engage with mental health during tough times.”

By analysing Twitter hashtags such as #MentalHealth and #EndTheStigma during May, a month internationally recognised for mental health awareness campaigns and the most popular period for mental health discourse on the platform, the study tracked the evolution of mental health-related retweets from 2018 to 2021. This analysis allowed the researchers to compare social media activity across different crisis phases: pre-crisis (2018 to 2019), early-crisis (2019 to 2020), and late-crisis (2020 to 2021).