Completing the daily questionnaire

Thank you for taking part in our daily social media experience study and downloading the #So.Me App. As part of this study, you will be asked to complete a short questionnaire 5-8 times per day for 14 days, through the #So.Me App.

The aim of the study is to find out how young people use and experience social media and how they feel throughout the day. While research is often done by asking people to try and remember how they felt at particular times, we know that asking people later can be inaccurate. We will therefore be using our app to ask how you feel ‘in the moment’. 

Please read this guidance page carefully before starting your 14-day daily questionnaire period.

It will tell you what you can expect to happen during those 14 days and how to respond to questions in the questionnaire.

You can revisit it at any time during the study if you need to refresh your memory. You will find it in the menu of the #So.Me App under ‘Questionnaire guidance’. We recommend that you do not try to read it whilst trying to complete a questionnaire, as we want you to focus on responding to the questionnaire.

What can you expect to happen during the study?

The daily questionnaire study will start 2 days after you have downloaded the #So.Me App and will last for 14 days. During these 14 days, the #So.Me App will track the apps you use on your phone to help us understand how often, and how long you spend on social media each day.

You will also receive 5-8 notifications per day, usually when you are on social media. These notifications will ask you to complete the short daily questionnaire. The questionnaire should take you around a minute to complete.

Responding to notifications

You will not receive notifications during the school day so you should follow the usual rules about where and how you store your phone while you’re at school.

You will get notifications before and after school, including in the evenings. During these times it is really important that you have your phone on you, and that it is charged, as you go about your normal life. We want to measure your daily life as it is, so it is important that you continue with your regular daily routines.

Don’t change your normal habits to fit around the questionnaires and remember the social media tracking and your responses about this will not be used to judge you. If you go to bed early and do not want to be disturbed by an evening notification, you may want to put your phone on silent or ‘do not disturb’.

Remember, keep your life as it would normally be - don’t stay up to complete as many notifications as possible.

Instructions on completing the daily questionnaire

When you receive a notification, fill out the questionnaire immediately. Please fill it out on as many occasions as you can. You may be in the middle of something on social media or something else on your phone, but we would like to know how you feel in that moment so responding straight away is really important and the notification will expire after a certain amount of time.

We know that there will be times where you may not have your phone on you, and everyone will miss a few notifications throughout the 14 days. For instance, if you are in the shower or playing for your football team. Notifications will remain live on your phone for a short amount of time before they expire, so if you have been away from your phone you can check if there is a live one to complete.

To help make sure you can complete as many questionnaires as possible, keep your phone on you, charged and on sound/vibrate.

Responding to individual questionnaire items

The questionnaire is made of 15-19 questions. In general, please try to:

  • Respond as soon as you receive a notification.

  • Respond as honestly as possible, nobody else will see your responses except the research team.

  • It is important you don’t change your behaviour as we want to study social media in the real world. We won’t look at your behaviour as an individual or judge what you’re doing.

  • Remember that each question is asking you about your actions or experiences right now.

  • Only use the extreme options (1 or 7) if, for instance, you feel extremely happy/sad/tired. 

Please now read the information below carefully. It gives you guidance on how to interpret and respond to each question or statement in the daily questionnaire.

Question and response options

“What were you just doing on social media?”

  • I wasn’t on social media just now

  • Chatting privately (e.g. messaging, video calling)

  • Checking my notifications or status of a message (e.g., comments/likes/followers/DMs-delivered/unread)

  • Checking someone else’s profile (e.g., their followers/posts/likes)

  • Watching videos (including live, reels, briefs, stories, snaps)

  • Listening to music

  • Reading written content (e.g. blogs, tweets, forums)

  • Scrolling through my feed

  • Making my own content (e.g.,  pictures, videos, blogs)

  • Playing with filters

  • Gaming/playing socially

  • Browsing or shopping on social media

  • Liking (or other reaction)

  • Other

“Was any of the content from the previous question…”

  • Body positive

  • Educational

  • Inspirational

  • News/current affairs

  • Dangerous stunts

  • Entertaining/humorous

  • Adverts/promoted content

  • Fashion and beauty

  • Gaming

  • Self-care

  • Political

  • Religious

  • promoting self-harm 

  • Pornography 

  • Promoting eating disorders 

  • Promoting suicide 

  • Cyber bullying (e.g. roast accounts - could be bullying you or someone else)

  • Hate speech (e.g. racist, homophobic) 

  • Other harmful health content 

  • Casual chat with friends/family

  • None of the above

What are we asking about?

“What were you just doing on social media?”

Choose the option that best fits the most recent activity you were doing. If you were not on social media choose the first option “I am not on social media”. Only select other if what you’re doing is nowhere close to the options available. Answer honestly- no one will know it’s you or judge you, and this will make the research more accurate.

"Was any of the content from the previous question…”

Choose the option that best fits the most recent activity you were doing. Educational might include cooking or other kinds of tutorial videos. We will not tell anyone your answers and do not consider information about e.g., seeing self-harm content as a cause for concern. This is because we do not know why you saw it (you might not have searched for it yourself), and we do not know the context. If you are worried about anything or need support, click the ‘routes to support’ option in the app menu.

The remaining questions will all look like the image below. They all have a 1 (not at all) – 7 (very much) answer format. This means 4 is the mid-point. 

There is extra guidance for what “not at all” and “very much” mean for each specific statement below.

On your screen during the study you will only see “not at all” and “very much” when you get a notification.

Statements and how you should answer

STATEMENT: “What I was doing on social media was a good use of my time” (you will only receive this question if you indicate that you were just on social media) 

HOW TO RESPOND: We are interested in whether what you were doing on social media just now felt like a good use of your time, or would you have preferred to be doing something else? 

 1 = What I was doing on social media was not at all a good use of my time.

 7 = What I was doing on social media was a very good use of my time.

The remaining statements are about how you feel right now. These are all about feelings/experiences that change throughout the day. Think about right now (not how you feel in general).

STATEMENT: “I feel happy/cheerful right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you are feeling cheerful and happy. 

1 = I don’t feel happy/cheerful at all right now

7 = I feel very happy/cheerful right now

STATEMENT: “I feel angry right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you are feeling angry, cross or are losing your temper. 

1 = I don’t feel at all angry right now

7 = I feel very angry right now

STATEMENT: “I feel included right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about your sense of feeling included right now. We’re not asking whether you are physically with people but whether you have a sense of belonging to something or that you are not left out right now.

1 = I don’t feel at all included right now

7 = I feel very included right now

STATEMENT: “I feel stressed right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you stressed (not relaxed or calm). It doesn’t matter what you are stressed about or what has happened. We are just interested in how you feel right now.

1 = I don’t feel stressed at all right now

7 = I feel very stressed right now

STATEMENT: “I feel lonely right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about whether you feel lonely, not about whether you are physically alone. We know people can feel lonely even when they are in company. Try to think about where you sit on your personal scale for this right now. 

1 = I don’t feel lonely at all right now

7 = I feel very lonely right now

STATEMENT: “I feel good about how I look right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about how you feel about how you look right now.  For example, this might be about your face/body/hair/makeup/clothes/style. It doesn’t really matter which aspect you are thinking about. We are just interested in your feelings about this right now.

1 = I don’t feel at all good about how I look right now

7 = I feel very good about how I look right now.

STATEMENT: “I feel annoyed right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This question is about if you feel annoyed by anyone/anything or if someone/something is getting on your nerves. It doesn’t matter what or who it is- we’re just interested in whether you have any of these feelings.

1 = I don’t feel at all annoyed right now

7 = I feel very annoyed right now

STATEMENT: “I feel physically well right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you feel physically well. This is another general question to help us understand the broader picture of your day. Think about whether you have any symptoms (e.g. of a cold) or pain and how these are affecting how well you feel physically.

1 = I don’t feel physically well at all right now

7 = I feel very physically well right now

STATEMENT: “I feel like myself right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about how you feel about yourself right now. 

1 = I don’t like myself at all right now

7 = I very much like myself right now

STATEMENT: “I feel prefer to be alone right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This statement is not about whether there are other people around you. It’s about whether you (would) feel happy being around other people right now (or not). 

1 = I don’t at all prefer to be alone right now

7 = I very much prefer to be alone right now

STATEMENT: “I feel sad right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you are feeling low, down or unhappy. 

1 = I don’t feel at all sad right now

7 = I feel very sad right now

STATEMENT: “I feel tired right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you are tired or sleepy.

1 = I don’t feel at all tired right now

7 = I feel very tired right now

STATEMENT: “I feel worried right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you are feeling worried, anxious, preoccupied or nervous. 

1 = I don’t feel at all worried right now

7 = I feel very worried right now

STATEMENT: “I feel focused right now”

HOW TO RESPOND: This is about if you feel focused with a good attention span or are able to stay on task, not distracted. It doesn’t matter what you’re concentrating on- more your sense of if you are focused/on task.

1 = I don’t feel focused at all right now

7 = I feel very focused right now