Visualizing the Digital Mind: Social Media’s Impact on Mental Health
In an era where digital spaces have become our primary emotional landscape, "Scrolling Through Emotions" serves as a data-driven investigation into how our favorite apps shape our mental well-being. By analyzing a year of user-level data (May 2024–April 2025) through R-Studio and Tableau, the project transcends simple screen-time metrics to reveal how different platforms serve as distinct emotional hubs. Through advanced K-means clustering, the research uncovers that while Instagram often fosters happiness, it simultaneously drives high levels of social comparison among women, whereas platforms like Twitter and WhatsApp are more frequently linked to anger and anxiety. Ultimately, by utilizing Random Forest predictive modeling, the project identifies Age as the most significant predictor of emotional state, specifically highlighting university students as the group most vulnerable to digital fatigue and depression.