Table 4.

Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale (BSMAS)

BSMAS instruction: ”Below you find some questions about your relationship to social media and your use of social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, …). Choose for each question the response that describes you best. How often during the last year have you…”
Item	Criterion (Andreassen et al., 2012)	Difficulties	Suggestions for improvement	Statements of the participants
(1) […] spent a lot of time thinking about social media or planned use of social media?	Salience	High scorings rarely correspond to the underlying criterion “salience”. Participants rather thought about specific content or news they saw online or interactions with other people on social media.	Consider to explore if social media use has a negative impact on participants' daily life (e.g., “[…] although you have other important things to do?”).	“When something happens and it's in the news and I see it on Facebook […] I think about it.” “Of course […] when you have a conflict with someone or maybe you're planning a meeting […]. Then you probably think about it a lot.”
		The term “planning” seems too abstract in the context of social media use.	Consider to delete the complete term “planning to use social media”.	“I don't plan it. […] To plan […] that's strange with social media.”
(2) […] felt an urge to use social media more and more?	Tolerance	Participants thought about important social interactions without significant impairments in daily life.	See above (e.g., “[…] although you have other important things to do?”).	“This particular person I'm writing with, online right now […] we are talking about something important. So, I would say […] it happened more often that I really felt the urge to do so.”
(3) […] used social media to forget about personal problems?	Mood modification	High scorings were often associated with functional emotional regulation strategies, e.g., seeking social support via social media.	Reword the item to make sure that participants do not refer to functional emotional regulation strategies.	“[…] only to contact friends and talk about the problems and forget about them.”
		Participants had difficulties to define the term “personal problems”.	Consider to clarify this term.	“It depends on how you define personal problems […] if small things like boredom are part of it […] then sometimes to […] often.”
(4) […] tried to cut down on the use of social media without success?	Relapse	Participants had difficulties to define the term “cut down”.	Consider to clarify the term (e.g., “[…] significantly cut down your social media use to feel confident?”)	“What does cut down mean? […] Is it about a few minutes? Is it about hours?”
(5) […] become restless or troubled if you have been prohibited from using social media?	Withdrawal	Participants tend to refer to long-term technical problems.	Consider to specify the instruction of the BSMAS (e.g., “In your answers, please do not refer to technical problems”).	“If our Wi-Fi […] doesn't work, you get a bit anxious. Because you can't do anything […] if you don't have Internet access for two or three weeks.” “When I was at school and I forgot my phone at home […] I was worried because I lived in the village and I couldn't get away there myself.”
		Participants rarely correspond to the underlying criterion “withdrawal” but rather to important social events that happen in real-life.	Consider to specify the context (e.g., “[…] when you couldn't use social media because of daily obligations?”)	“The other day I confessed my love to my best buddy […]. I was a bit worried that he doesn't answer me […].”
(6) […] used social media so much that it has had a negative impact on your job/studies?	Conflict	No relevant comments. This item was easy to understand.
Overall findings of the BSMAS		The time frame of 12 months seems too long. Participants usually refer to the past weeks.	Consider to shorten the time frame.	“I think a year is such an insanely long period […]. I couldn't summarize something like that.”
		The instruction “How often in the last year have you” is mentioned once above all items. Many participants skipped the instruction and were confused about the time frame when they tried to answer the items.	Consider to include the time frame in the beginning of each item.	“Hard to answer because I don't know what time frame is intended […].” “Oh, up there, I didn't even read this […].”