Psychological well-being and adaptation to the risks of digital world at a young age

Background. Psychological well-being of a modern person is largely connected with his adaptation to the risks of the digital world. A review of modern studies into psychological consequences of everyday digitalization suggests that the latter affects all areas of the personality: motivational, cognitive, and affective ones, as well as the features of self-awareness.

Objective. The task of the pilot study was to determine the possible relationships between the level of psychological well-being and the content of personal dispositions related to it (hardiness and dispositional optimism) with the features of adaptation to digital everyday life.

Sample. The study was conducted on a youth sample of 131 people. The average age of respondents was 22.8 years (median age = 21), 118 females, 13 male respondents).

Methods. The paper uses standardized scales of psychological well-being, resilience, dispositional optimism and a questionnaire specially designed for the purposes of the study aimed at identifying the level of psychological adaptation to digitalization, which included the scales of digital anxiety, behavioral, communicative and normative adaptation.

Results. The check of reliability of the scales in the questionnaire of psychological adaptation to digitalization gave acceptable results. Indicators of digital anxiety are negatively associated with indicators of psychological well-being, resilience and dispositional optimism. Behavioral and normative adaptation to the risks of digital world are not associated with psychological well-being and dispositional optimism, though they do positively correlate with resilience. Indicators of communicative adaptation were not associated with any of the methods used.

Conclusion. Modern youth have a developed repertoire of skills to ensure their own digital security and to organize a conscious information search, though at the same time they follow certain norms of virtual interaction that are consonant with social norms. However, this does not increase confidence in the ability to protect oneself and influence one’s own digital everyday life, which explains the generally weak correlation of indicators of digital adaptation with psychological well-being, general resilience and dispositional optimism.

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