Due to technological advancements such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models, chatbots enable increasingly human-like, real-time conversations through text (e.g., OpenAI’s ChatGPT) and voice (e.g., Amazon’s Alexa). One AI chatbot that is specifically designed to meet the social-supportive needs of youth is Snapchat’s My AI. Given its increasing popularity among adolescents, the present study investigated whether adolescents’ likelihood of using My AI, as well as their positive or negative emotional experiences from interacting with the chatbot, is related to socio-demographic factors (i.e., gender, age, and socioeconomic status (SES)). A cross-sectional study was conducted among 303 adolescents (64.1% girls, 35.9% boys, 1.0% other, 0.7% preferred not to say their gender; M_age = 15.89, SD_age = 1.69). The findings revealed that younger adolescents were more likely to use My AI and experienced more positive emotions from these interactions than older adolescents. No significant relationships were found for gender or SES. These results highlight the potential for age to play a critical role in shaping adolescents’ engagement with AI chatbots on social media and their emotional outcomes from such interactions, underscoring the need to consider developmental factors in AI design and policy.

Unlike most social media, the new platform BeReal encourages users to present an authentic self. Since such self-presentations are assumed to have positive effects, this study examined whether adolescents’ authentic self-presentations on BeReal relate to a higher self-esteem and whether self-concept clarity plays a role in that relationship. The relationships between exposure to perceived authentic self-presentations of others, social comparison on BeReal, and self-esteem were also explored. Of the 367 adolescents who participated in our cross-sectional survey, a total of 148 (40.33%, M _age = 16.23, SD _age = 1.46; 82.4% girls) had an account on BeReal. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), we found that these adolescents’ authentic self-presentations were not significantly related to their self-concept clarity nor indirectly to their self-esteem. Self-esteem and self-concept clarity were, however, positively correlated. Regarding exposure to others’ content on BeReal, only upward and lateral social comparisons on these platforms were significantly related to a lower and higher self-esteem, respectively.

Youth perfectionism levels have increased significantly over the last decades. Given the dominance of picture-perfect content, social media are often designated as contributors of this rise. Accordingly, this study examined how exposure to positive social media content might increase adolescents’ perfectionistic dispositions and vice versa. Moreover, it was explored whether upward social comparison and adolescents’ individualism values as well as country play, respectively, a mediating and moderating role. A three-wave panel study was conducted among 1,697 Belgian, French, and Slovenian adolescents ( M _age = 15.14, SD _age = 1.78, 57.2% girls). At the between-person level, the results showed that higher levels of exposure to positive content are related to higher levels of perfectionism. Higher upward social comparison levels are related to higher levels of exposure to positive content and of socially prescribed perfectionism. A more complex pattern emerged at the within-person level with different results depending on the selected time intervals, countries, and adolescents’ individualistic values.

Due to technological advancements such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLM’s), chatbots enable increasingly human-like, real time conversations through text (e.g., OpenAI’s ChatGPT) and voice (e.g., Amazon’s Alexa). One AI chatbot which is specifically designed to meet the social-supportive needs of youth, is Snapchat’s My AI. Given its increasing popularity among adolescents, the present study investigated whether adolescents’ likelihood of using My AI, as well as their positive or negative emotional experiences from interacting with the chatbot, are related to socio-demographic factors (i.e., gender, age, socioeconomic status). A cross-sectional study was conducted among 303 adolescents (64.1% girls, 35.9% boys, 1.0% other, 0.7% preferred not to say their gender; Mage = 15.89, SDage = 1.69). The findings revealed that younger adolescents were more likely to use My AI and experienced more positive emotions from these interactions than older adolescents. No significant rela-tionships were found for gender or SES. These results highlight the potential for age to play a critical role in shaping adolescents' engagement with AI chatbots on social media and their emotional outcomes from such interactions, underscoring the need to consider developmental factors in AI design and policy.

Adolescence is a critical period for identity development, often accompanied by identity distress. Simultaneously, adolescents are also preoccupied with presenting themselves as positive as possible on social media, which may reflect and reinforce identity distress. Yet, the dynamic associations between adolescents’ identity distress and positive online self-presentations remain unexplored. Accordingly, this three-wave panel study among adolescents from Belgium, France, and Slovenia (N = 1697; Mage = 15.14, SDage = 1.78, 57.2% girls) used Latent Class Growth Analysis to identify distinct co-trajectories of identity distress and positive online self-presentation in the domains of friendship and appearance over one year. The findings showed that identity distress and positive self-presentations can follow maladaptive, adaptive, or stable co-trajectories over time, depending on the identity domain, adolescents’ demographic and social media use characteristics. In doing so, the study provides novel evidence on the heterogeneous co-development of adolescents’ identity distress and online self-presentation.