The authors of this article, Lim, Donovan, Kaufman, and Ishida, conducted a series of “fixed-effects panel models” to examine the relationship between NFL athletes’ social media activities and their on-field performances. They found a negative relationship between social media posting frequency and performance, as well as finding that players who posted content with a higher level of humility were more likely to have better performances.
This article and this research perfectly illustrate a negative aspect of social media as it applies to professional athletes, and probably the rest of the population. This article doesn’t heavily explore the “why” of the results that they see, but it’s well-known that social media can be addicting and distracting, and one can reasonably assume that athletes that use social media more heavily are distracted from their primary role as an athlete, leading to suffering of performance. In addition, social media use and exposure to public criticism on social media can lead to mental health issues, and these can also have a negative impact on athletic performance.
International Journal of Sport Communication, 2021, 14, 33–59 https://doi.org/10.1123/ijsc.2020-0055
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