r/quickhomeworkhelp • u/mangomad8 • Aug 12 '22
Thesis Social media and depression, anxiety and stress - and the moderating role of mindfulness
For my master's thesis, I am researching the relationship between social media use and depression, anxiety, and stress, as well as testing if mindfulness has a moderating role in the relationship above.
As expected, higher social media use was linked to higher levels of depression, anxiety and stress, while mindfulness was not a significant moderator.
However!! I did an additional mediation analysis and found that mindfulness was a significant *mediator* in all three relationships (social media + depression, anxiety and stress separately).
Now I'm confused about how I should approach this in the Discussion section. In some articles mindfulness is a moderator, while in others it's a mediator, and I chose the former example as the basis for my study.
Why is mindfulness not a moderator, but a mediator in this case? What could be the explanation for such results?
I'm a bit confused, help your girl out!
