Inside the black mirror: current perspectives on the role of social media in mental illness self-diagnosis

Abstract

Abstract The purpose of this article is to analyze the existing literature on the role of identity in mental illness and self-diagnostic behavior among individuals on social media. In this paper, we consolidate existing frameworks for illness identity formation based on principles of social contagion and community formation principles to conceptualize abnormal behaviors related to social media use, including Munchausen’s by Internet, mass social media-induced illness, and mass sociogenic illness. The importance of a diagnosis in personal identity formation and ingroup involvement is an emergent theme in this review. Social media communities represent a cultural antithesis of the medical establishment by rejecting healthcare expertise and creating spaces whose membership is only afforded through a psychiatric diagnosis for individuals to participate in shared experiences. Clinical implications of these findings include tools to identify and dismantle harmful self-pathologizing of normal behavioral variants in young adults who present with specific symptomatology.

Keywords

• Social media
• Diagnosis
• Mental health
• Mental illness
• Self-diagnosis
• Psychopathology