University of Amsterdam: Project AWeSome wins Outstanding Interdisciplinary Contribution Award

Project AWeSome receives the Outstanding Interdisciplinary Contribution Award of the Society for Research on Adolescence. AWeSome investigates adolescents, well-being and social media and was established by Patti Valkenburg (University of Amsterdam) and Loes Keijsers (Erasmus University).

AWeSome (Adolescents, Well-being, and Social Media) investigates why social media make some teens happy while leaving others feeling blue. The team uses experience sampling designs, in which hundreds of adolescents are invited to answer short surveys on their smartphones across multiple weeks. Their answers are analyzed with innovative methods that enable studying the effects of social media on each individual adolescent. ‘Such person-specific effects have not been studied before, simply because the methods of analysis to do so did not yet exist’, states Valkenburg. ‘Team AWeSome is also one of the first to study the social media archives of adolescents to understand what they do and see on social media and how their experiences influence their well-being.’

The Outstanding Interdisciplinary Contribution Award was issued during the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence (SRA) on Friday 4 March.