Original Article

Neuropsychiatr Invest. 2022;60(3):78-84

10.5152/NeuropsychiatricInvest.2022.22011

The Relationship Between Attachment Style, Eating Behavior, Emotion Regulation, and
Social Media Addiction During COVID-19 Pandemic

Ecem Özmen , Halime Şenay Güzel

Department of Psychology, Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University, Faculty of Human and Social Science, Ankara, Turkey

ABSTRACT

Objective: The COVID-19 pandemic affected the usage of social media and other attitudes, such as eating
routines. In the present study, the relationship between social media addiction and attachment, eating
behavior, and emotion regulation was analyzed in individuals who had an experience of online education
or working online during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: This study consists of 194 participants who experienced online working or education in Turkey
during the COVID-19 pandemic. Demographic form, Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale, Inventory
of Experiences in Close Relationships, The Emotion Regulation Difficulty Scale Brief Form, and Eating
Attitudes Test-Short Form were used to collect related information. According to demographic informa-
tion, the present study consists of 141 female and 44 male participants.

Results: Anxious attachment, eating behavior and its 2 subscales which were social pressure and preoc-
cupation with eating, emotion dysregulation, and its all subscales were found positively correlated with
social media addiction. Regression analyses revealed that only anxious attachment (t = 8.01, P < .001)
and “goals” that is subscale of emotion dysregulation were found as a predictor of social media addiction
(t = 4.96, P < .05). In addition, a statistically significant relationship was found between the increase in the
frequency of social media usage during the pandemic and social media addiction.

Conclusion: According to the results of the study, the usage of social media has increased during the
pandemic period, and this increase has brought up the risk of social media addiction. As a result, it was
emphasized that the relationship between attachment types and emotion regulation should be consid-
ered in future studies about social media addiction.

Keywords: Social media addiction, attachment style, emotion regulation, eating behavior

Corresponding author:
Ecem Özmen INTRODUCTION

E-mail: Coronavirus, also called COVID-19, was first reported in Wuhan, China, in 2019 and then, it has spread
ecemozmenn@gmail.com around the world rapidly.1 According to World Human Organization (WHO), coronavirus disease
was announced as a universal pandemic on March of 2020.1 The first case in Turkey was reported in
Received: May 21, 2022 March 11, 2020, and lockdown was applied at various intervals after this date.2 A recent study showed
Accepted: August 19, 2022
Publication Date: September 14, 2022

Cite this article as: Özmen E, Şenay Güzel H. The relationship between attachment style, eating behavior, emotion
regulation, and social media addiction during COVID-19 pandemic. Neuropsychiatr Invest. 2022;60(3):78-84.

Copyright@Author(s) - Available online at neuropsychiatricinvestigation.org.

Content of this journal is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

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Neuropsychiatr Invest. 2022;60(3):78-84

that COVID-19 affected psychological well-being negatively, espe- regulation is not about rejecting some feelings that are about to
cially depression symptoms, anxiety, deficiency in sleeping, and moderate the practice of related emotions22 but consists of some
stress.3 dimensions that are about lack of clarity, limited emotional regula-
tion strategies, impulsivity, awareness, goals, and nonacceptance.22
During a pandemic, online working conditions have caused exces- These dimensions are important for understanding and approving
sive using of social media,3 and using social media requires the inter- emotions and also managing situations. If these skills cannot be
net. According to the data of 2020, the frequency of internet usage applied in life, emotion dysregulation can occur and it has a crucial
was found to be 70%, but after 1 year, the frequency of internet usage role in the individual’s behavior.22 Recent findings have shown that
was found to be 80% according to the data of the first 3 months of there is an association between attachment and emotion dysregu-
2021.4 The increase in using the internet may be the consequence lation with social media usage.23 For example, using Facebook was
of COVID-19 pandemic. While many employees were working online problematically associated with emotion dysregulation.24 During
from home due to the pandemic, many students were also studying the COVID-19 pandemic, certain emotion regulation strategies such
online. Moreover, a recent study has shown that social media usage as cognitive reappraisal have been shown to be useful for escaping
increased during lockdown, especially among young people.5 Both social media which includes stressors about COVID-19.4 Especially
the coronavirus pandemic process and also internet and social media for women, insecure attachment is a related factor for unhealthy
usage in the pandemic had a risk on mental health.6 A recent study eating behavior with emotion dysregulation; women are at a risk
showed that school-aged children faced psychological risks and group for binge eating when they had a problem to moderate nega-
problems due to excessive usage of social media.8 Another previous tive feelings.20
study demonstrated that children who used social media excessively
showed depressive and stressful reactions and suffered from obe- Therefore, recent studies demonstrated that attachment style, eat-
sity.9 So, social media addiction and psychological problems were ing behavior, and emotion regulation are associated with each other,
found to be related during the COVID-19 pandemic period. and also each of them is related to social media addiction one by
one. Looking at the literature, there has been no study in which all
Social media addiction is related to excessive use of applications these variables were studied together, especially in the Turkish pop-
and Internet addiction.10 There are some factors that affect social ulation during the pandemic period. For this reason, it was thought
media addiction: one of them is an individual’s attachment pattern. that the study would make a unique contribution to the literature. As
Attachment theory refers to the role of emotional bonds between a result of the study, it was estimated that the variables would pre-
infant and attachment figure, especially caregiver, on people’s dict social media addiction. The main goal of this paper is to analyze
certain action.11 This emotional bond not only affects an infant’s the relationship of these variables with the effects of the COVID-19
behavior but also affects teenagers or adults’ behavior.11 There are pandemic.
3 attachment styles and those are secure, anxious, and avoidant
attachment; anxiously or avoidantly attached people often show METHODS
nervousness in their relationships.12 According to a review study,
there is a positive relationship between insecure attachment styles Participants
and social media addiction,13 and also a recent study has shown that The sample size was calculated using the G*Power (version 3.1)
social media addiction was found to be significant for anxious and application. Type I error was regarded as α = 0.05 and power as
avoidant attached people.14 0.95. Considering that some participants will be outliers, the sample
consists of 194 participants who had experience working online
Furthermore, attachment styles are associated with eating behav- or online education conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic in
iors. A recent meta-analysis study has demonstrated that although Turkey. Participants were included in the study via online survey
eating behavior disorder is linked to insecure attachment style, which was shared on social media sites. There are no incentives for
secure attachment is associated with low level of eating behavior participation.
disorder.15 In a new study, binge-eating attitude has been associated
with excessive social media usage of insecurely attached people.16 Materials
Also, data have shown that people’s eating routine is not the same Demographic form has been prepared by researchers and it includes
after the COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia.17 Moreover, it was also questions related to age, gender, marital status, and diagnosis of
shown that the pandemic had a negative effect on eating behavior COVID-19 in online working or education conditions.
in Italy.18 It is highly remarkable to see similar results on association
with eating and social media addiction in 2 different cultures of dif- Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale was used for evaluating the
ferent geographical countries such as Saudi Arabia and Italy. During social media addiction level of participants. The original form was
the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a positive relationship between developed by Anderssan et al.25 Turkish adaptation of scale was done
using social media and unhealthy eating behavior, but using social by Demirci.26 The scale consists of 6 items and has a 5-point Likert
media was found to be not dangerous for people who already have type ranging from quite rare (1) to quite often (5). The minimum
eating disorder problems.19 Therefore, people who do not have any score of the scale is 6 and the maximum score is 30. Cronbach’s alpha
eating disorder problems are affected more when they use social value was found to be 0.79. In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha
media. value was found to be 0.84 for this material.

Unhealthy eating behavior is often linked to unbeneficial emo- Inventory of Experiences in Close Relationships (YIYE-II) was used for
tion regulation strategies.20 Emotional regulation defined21 as “the analyzing participants’ attachment styles. The original name of the
extrinsic and intrinsic processes responsible for monitoring, evalu- scale is “Experiences in Close Relat​ionsh​ips-R​evise​d (ECR-R),” and it
ating, and modifying emotional reactions, especially their intensive was developed by Fraley et al.27 Turkish translation study was made
and temporal features, to accomplish one’s goals” (p. 27). Emotion by Selçuk et al.28 The Cronbach’s alpha value was 0.90 for avoidance

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Neuropsychiatr Invest. 2022;60(3):78-84

and 0.86 for anxiety. When the test–retest values were examined, it with social media addiction. In this study, the Pearson product
was found to be 0.91 for anxiety and 0.90 for avoidance. The scale moment correlation coefficient was used to see the relationship
consists of 36 questions, 18 of them are related to anxiety and other between basic variables. Then, multiple regression analysis was
18 of them are related to avoidance. Each item is rated on 7-point conducted with these correlated variables to examine predictors of
Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree). In the present social media addiction.
study, Cronbach’s alpha value was found to be 0.90 for anxiety and
0.89 for avoidance. RESULTS

The Emotion Regulation Difficulty Scale Brief Form (DERS-16) was In this study, 141 females (31.9%) and 44 males (30.1%), totaling 185
used to determine the emotion regulation difficulty of the partici- adults between the ages of 19 and 63, took part. Descriptive statis-
pants. It was published by Bjureberg et al.29 and was adapted into tics for the variables used in this study are presented in Table 1.
Turkish by Yiğit and Güzey-Yiğit.30 There are 16 items and 5 subscales
which are clarity, goals, impulse, strategies, and non-acceptance. The Correlation Analysis
scale has 5-point Likert structure (1 = never to 5 = always). The inter- The relationship between social media addiction, attachment, eating
nal consistency coefficients were found to be 0.92. Cronbach’s alpha behavior, and emotion regulation was investigated using Pearson
coefficient values were found to be 0.86 and 0.88. according to 2 dif- correlation analysis. According to results, social media addiction was
ferent parts of material.30 In this study, Cronbach’s alpha value was positively correlated with anxious attachment (r = 0.36; P < .01), emo-
found to be 0.9; the subscale’s reliability was found to be 0.84 for tion regulation difficulties (r = 0.30; P < .01), and its subscales which
clarity, 0.84 for goals, 0.87 for impulse, 0.87 for strategies, and 0.78 for are goals, impulse, strategies, clarity, and non-acceptance (r = 0.31;
nonacceptance.30 In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha value was P < .01, r = 0.24; P < .01, r = 0.28; P < .01, r = 0.24; P < .01, r = 0.19;
found to be 0.78 for this scale. For the subscales, Cronbach’s alpha
value was found to be 0.85 for clarity, 0.77 for goals, 0.88 for impulse,
Table 1. Demographic Data of the Participants
0.88 for strategies, and 0.81 for nonacceptance in this study.
N %
Eating Attitudes Test-Short Form (EAT-26) was used to evaluate par- Gender
ticipants’ eating behavior. The original form of scale was developed Female 141 76.2
by Garner et al.31 The Turkish version of this scale was developed by Male 44 23.8
Erguney-Okumus and Sertel-Berk.32 The scale has 3 subscales which Marital status
are preoccupation with eating, restricting, and social pressure. Also, Married 67 36.2
20-point is a cut point. Having 20 or more points is a cue about Single 116 62.7
unhealthy eating attitudes.32 The Cronbach’s alpha coefficients were Divorced 1 0.5
found to be 0.84.32 In the present study, Cronbach’s alpha value Widowed 1 0.5
was 0.78.
Education level
High school graduate 3 1.6
Procedure
University graduate/ postgraduate 102 55.1
Ethical approval was taken from Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University
Ethical Council in December 9, 2021, no: 34. The participation link Student 80 43.2
was shared on some social media sites, such as Instagram, Twitter, Monthly income
and Facebook using Google Forms. The reason for selecting this Low to minimum wage 20 10.8
social media application is that these sites are the more popular sites 3.000₺-5.000₺ 41 22.2
in Turkey at 2021.33 Totally 194 participants completed the online 5.001₺-7.000₺ 61 33.0
survey. At the beginning of the questionnaire, participants were 7.001₺-10.000₺ 33 17.8
informed about research and their rights. After the informed consent Over 10.000₺ 30 16.2
part, there is a passage about the COVID-19 pandemic. This passage Job
includes some information about pandemic process, for instance, Government employee 14 7.6
the first case in Turkey, the date of closing schools, time of lock-  Professional job employee (lawyer, teacher, doctor, 78 42.2
downs, and passing the online working and education process. For engineer, etc.)
this study, only participants who had online working and education Student 87 47.0
experience could participate in the study. The exclusion criterion is Unemployed 5 2.7
to continue working in the workplace or office during the pandemic. Retired 1 0.5
Having social media 175 94.6
Statistical Analysis Number of social media
Nine participants with extremely high Z scores as outliers were
None/1/2/3 144 77.8
eliminated from the analysis. The remaining 185 participants were
More than 3 41 22.1
included in the analysis. To conduct statistical analysis, Statistical
Thoughts about social media usage
Package for the Social Sciences (version of 22.0) was used. Shapiro–
Increased 141 76.2
Wilks and Kolmogorov–Smirnov tests were used to examine the
normal distribution results for the variables. George and Mallery34 Decreased 6 3.2
demonstrated that if the value of skewness and kurtosis is between Same 38 20.5
−1 and +1, then it demonstrated that variables were normally dis- COVID-19 diagnosis 37 20.0
tributed. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and independent  Having quarantine because of COVID-19 diagnose 77 41.6
t-test were used to examine demographical variables’ association or contact with patients

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Table 2. Pearson Correlations of Variables

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13
1 1
2 0.36** 1
3 0.13 0.51** 1
4 0.30** 0.56** 0.30** 1
5 0.31** 0.38** 0.27** 0.77** 1
6 0.27** 0.53** 0.28** 0.93** 0.65** 1
7 0.18* 0.57** 0.24** 0.83** 0.53** 0.75** 1
8 0.23** 0.43** 0.36** 0.71** 0.48** 0.57** 0.53** 1
9 0.24** 0.39** 0.14* 0.83** 0.52** 0.74** 0.59** 0.53** 1
10 0.16* 0.17* 0.11 0.19** 0.13 0.13 0.22** 0.22** 0.12 1
11 0.15* 0.21** 0.18* 0.27** 0.20** 0.20** 0.29** 0.29** 0.20** 0.82* 1
12 −0.01 −0.07 −0.06 −0.09 −0.07 −0.07 −0.06 −0.05 −0.11 0.62** 0.17* 1
13 0.17* 0.14 0.05 0.12 0.09 0.10 0.17* 0.10 0.05 0.47** 0.18* 0.21** 1
1, Social Media Addiction; 2, Anxious Attachment; 3, Avoidant Attachment; 4, The Emotion Regulation Difficulty Scale Brief Form (DERS-16) Total Score; 5, Goals;
6, Strategies; 7, Non-acceptance; 8, Clarity; 9, Impulse; 10, Eating Attitudes Test-Short Form (EAT-26) Score; 11, Preoccupation with eating; 12, Restriction;
13, Social Pressure.
*P < .05; **P < .01.

P < .01, respectively). Total eating behavior score was found to be on social media addiction. According to the results of the correla-
positively correlated with social media addiction (r = 0.16; P < .05), tion analysis, regression analysis was performed with the variables.
social pressure (r = 0.17; P < .05), and preoccupation with eating Anxious attachment and goals, a sub-dimension of emotion regu-
(r = 0.15; P < .05) which are subscales of eating behavior. All values lation, were found to predict social media addiction. The anxious
related to the correlation analysis are given in Table 2. attachment style was entered in the first block; in the second block,
all the subscales of emotion regulation were included stepwise, and
Analysis of Variables Associated with Social Media Addiction lastly, in the third block, only “social pressure and preoccupation
Independent t test and ANOVA were applied to analyze the differ- with eating” subscales of eating attitude were included in stepwise.
entiation between social media addiction and demographic data As shown in Table 4, according to the regression analysis, model 1
such as gender, age, and social media usage frequency. During the was found to be statistically significant (F change = 27.76; R = 0.36;
analysis, social media addiction was considered as dependent vari- R² = 0.13; P < .05). Therefore, anxious attachment style explained
able and other variables as independent variables. As a result of the 13% of the change in social media addiction. In the second step,
analysis, a statistically significant difference was found only between it was found that the goals predicted social media addiction and
the frequency of social media use (F = 12.18; P < .05), which changed resulted in a significant increase in R2 (F change = 7.38; R = 0.40;
during the pandemic period and social media addiction. Results R² = 0.16; P < .05). Accordingly, anxious attachment and goals have
of ANOVA analysis are given in Table 3. According to the post hoc an effect size of 16% on social media addiction. However, in the third
Tukey analysis, the social media addiction of individuals whose social model, none of the subscales of eating attitude predicted social
media usage frequency increased during the pandemic was found media addiction. As a result of the analysis, it was found that anxious
to be higher (X = 3.11; SE = 0.17) than those who have same social attachment style and goals predict social media addiction during
media usage frequency during the pandemic. the pandemic period. All variables related to the regression analysis
are given in Table 4.
Results of Regression Analysis
In this study, regression analysis was performed to examine the DISCUSSION
effects of attachment, eating behavior, and emotion regulation
The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between
Table 3. One-Way ANOVA Analysis attachment style, emotion regulation, and eating behavior on
social media addiction during the COVID-19 pandemic. First of all,
Sum of Squares df Mean Square F P
demographic variables were analyzed on the effect of social media
Between groups 21.33 2 10.66 12.18 <.05
addiction. However, while no significant relationship was found
Within groups 159.30 182 0.87
between variables such as gender, age, education level or socioeco-
Total 180.64 184 nomic status, and social media addiction in the study, some studies

Table 4. Multiple Linear Regression

R R2 Adjusted R2 F Standardized Coefficient ß P
Model 1 0.36 0.13 0.12 27.76 <.001
Attachment: Anxious 0.36
Model 2 0.40 0.16 0.15 18.25 <.001
Attachment: Anxious 0.28
Emotion Regulation: Goals 0.19
Dependent variable: Social media addiction

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in the literature have found a significant relationship with socio- Present study’s results were consistent with that results, but only 2
demographic variables. For example, a recent study showed that subscales of eating behavior were found to be positively related to
social media addiction is related to age, that is, young people are social media addiction. When the relationship between social pres-
more addicted to social media.14 It has also been shown that women sure and eating attitude was examined, it had been determined that
are more dependent on social media sites than men in terms of social pressure was related to the changing in eating behavior, and
gender differences.35 The reason for this inconsistency may be that as a result of this relationship, people experienced preoccupation
previous studies were not performed during the pandemic period. with eating.40 From this point of view, it can be estimated that pres-
Considering that this study was conducted during the COVID-19 sures of being thin on social media can be related to sub-scales of
pandemic, it can be said that the change in the frequency of use of eating attitudes which are social pressure and preoccupation with
social media applications during the pandemic process is related to eating.
social media addiction. A study on this subject showed that during
the pandemic period, the use of social media has increased due to As a result of this study, when the predictors of social media addic-
the excessive use of official messages, checking e-mails, and follow- tion were investigated, anxious attachment style and goals, which
ing the current news about COVID-19, especially among adults.36 So, are a subscale of emotion regulation, were found to be predictors
the result of our study showed that the frequency of social media use of social media. In the literature, not only substance-related addic-
has increased regardless of some demographic variables during the tions but also behavioral addictions (gambling, internet usage)
COVID-19 pandemic. were found to be associated with emotion regulation difficulties
with deficiency of attachment style.41 For social media addiction, it
In this study, the correlations of the variables with social media has been mentioned that excessive usage of social media sites was
addiction were investigated. The correlation analysis of this study predicted by anxious type of attachment with emotional dysregu-
showed that all subscales of emotion regulation, anxious attach- lation.23 According to another previous study, emotion regulation
ment, and only 2 subscales of eating attitude—social pressure and was found to be related to predictors of social media addiction with
preoccupation with eating—were positively associated with social anxious type of attachment except with avoidance attachment.42
media addiction. For the attachment styles, there was no significant These findings supported the present study nearly because anxious
correlation between avoidant attachment style and social media attachment and emotion dysregulation were predictors of social
addiction. This result is supported by the result of a study conducted media addiction, but only 1 subscale of emotion dysregulation
by Senormancı et al.37 that people with anxious attachment use the which is “goals” predicted social media addiction with anxious type
internet more, but no relationship was found for people with avoid- of attachment. Goals, a sub-scale of the emotion dysregulation scale,
ant attachment in the Turkish population. While people with anxious emphasized difficulties in goal-oriented action.22 There are 3 ques-
attachment style were found to have a need for social interaction, tions under this subscale that are: “When I am upset, I have difficulty
avoidant attached people were found to be reluctant to establish getting work done; When I am upset, I have difficulty focusing on
social relationships.38 Therefore, it was thought that this result could other things; When I am upset, I have difficulty thinking about any-
be used to explain why social media addiction is more related to anx- thing else.”30 Therefore, it is expected that the person can move away
ious attachment style rather than avoidant attachment style. from goal-oriented behavior when he cannot regulate his emotions.
When the relationship between escape from the goals and social
When investigating the correlation of emotion regulation with social media addiction was examined, it was found that, especially, health
media addiction, a recent study demonstrated that emotion regu- workers have used social media platforms to deal with the nega-
lation was negatively affected by using some social media applica- tive emotions they experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic.43
tions, such as Facebook,24 but the other previous study showed that Therefore, it was thought that when people cannot regulate their
using social media is beneficial to avoid negative effects of COVID-19 emotions, they use social media more, which may cause them to
pandemic.4 Present study supported that all subscales of emotion be unable to focus on the goals in their personal lives. Although the
dysregulation were positively correlated with social media addiction. total score of eating behavior and 2 subscales were found positively
Regarding the sub-dimensions of emotion regulation, impulsivity is correlated, the inability of these variables to enter the model in the
associated with lack of control, non-acceptance is related to lack of regression analysis may be explained by the fact that the difficulty in
approval of emotional reactions, strategy sub-dimension reflects emotion regulation is more effective than eating behavior. The find-
have inadequate emotion regulation strategy, goals sub-dimension ings of the study suggested that individuals’ ability to regulate their
is related to problem in goal-oriented behaviors, and clarity sub- emotions has a greater effect on social media addiction rather than
dimension is related to having poor emotional clarity.22 Considering eating attitudes. In addition, when the reasons why eating behav-
the relationship between these subscales and social media addic- ior is less effective on social media addiction than emotion regula-
tion, it was thought that problem experienced in these subscales tion were examined, previous findings showed that people with
might cause escape behavior. The previous study in the literature unhealthy eating behavior are less affected by social media addic-
also emphasized that escape behavior was associated with behav- tion than people with healthy eating routines during the COVID-19
ioral addiction, especially related to internet usage.39 Therefore, diffi- pandemic.19 Therefore, the reason why eating behavior has little
culty in emotion regulation and its subscales may be associated with effect on social media addiction can be explained by the low effects
an escape behavior for social media addiction. on people with eating problems of social media addiction.

While looking at the correlation with eating behavior, social pres- The main contribution of this study is that it covers the pandemic
sure and preoccupation with eating were positively correlated with period because people in many countries were quarantined at
social media addiction but the restriction of food was not found to home during the pandemic period. Also, daily social media usage
be correlated with social media addiction. Previous research showed rates have increased during pandemic.5 As these characteristics
that there was a positive association between excessive usage of have changed during the pandemic, new findings should be added
social media and unhealthy eating behavior during the pandemic.23 to the literature to show differences in the pandemic. Therefore,

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Neuropsychiatr Invest. 2022;60(3):78-84

the biggest contribution of this study is to examine the variables (Sars-CoV-2 infection- scientific committee study) general information,
together with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, epidemiology and diagnosis]; 2020. Available at: https​://co​vid19​.sagl​
ik.go​v.tr/​Eklen​ti/39​551/0​/covi​d19re​hberi​genel​bilgi​lerep​idemi​yoloj​
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