A path analysis of 270 Argentinean university students reveals two distinct routes by which social media use undermines cognitive performance: one through bedtime smartphone use and disrupted sleep, the other through smartphone dependence itself.
What they found
Researchers at Pontificia Universidad Catolica Argentina assessed problematic smartphone use (PSU), social media frequency, bedtime smartphone use, sleep quality, and self-reported difficulties in working memory and inhibitory control. They used path analysis to trace the relationships.
Key figures:
- Higher social media frequency was significantly linked to both increased problematic smartphone use (PSU) and more bedtime smartphone use.
- Both PSU and bedtime smartphone use were in turn associated with poorer sleep quality.
- Poorer sleep quality and higher PSU scores were each associated with more frequent difficulties in working memory and inhibitory control, the cognitive skills that help you hold information in mind and resist impulses.
- The analysis identified two significant indirect pathways from social media to executive function difficulties:
- Sleep pathway: social media → bedtime use → poor sleep → cognitive difficulties
- Dependence pathway: social media → problematic use → cognitive difficulties
The authors suggest that social media acts as a “key covariate” driving both bedtime phone use and dependence, making it a potential upstream target for intervention.
Why it matters
The study adds to a growing body of evidence that screen habits affect not just how well you sleep, but how well your brain works the next day. The dual-pathway finding is important because it suggests that even if you manage to keep your phone out of the bedroom, heavy social media use may still impair cognition through the dependence pathway, compulsive checking that fragments attention regardless of time of day.
Limits
The study is cross-sectional, so causal direction cannot be confirmed. All measures were self-reported, which may not align with objective cognitive testing or actigraphy-based sleep measurement. The sample was limited to Argentinean university students, and results may differ in older or more diverse populations.
Bottom line
Social media use is linked to executive function difficulties through two paths: one that runs through bedtime phone use and poor sleep, and another through smartphone dependence itself. Reducing social media frequency, not just keeping the phone out of the bedroom, may be the more effective strategy.
And yes, that includes reading 1ban.news articles in bed. We’re flattered, but your working memory will thank you if you put the phone down and actually go to sleep.
Source
Collazo S, Tabullo AJ. Links between social media, bedtime smartphone use, sleep quality, and executive function difficulties in adults. Psychology, Health & Medicine. 2026;1-14. doi:10.1080/13548506.2026.2688451. PMID: 42299142.