Objective: To explore the impact of social media behaviors in adolescents with tic disorders.

Background: Social media has an increasing role in disseminating information and driving perceptions of disease. During the COVID-19 pandemic, social media consumption greatly increased, particularly in adolescent populations. In parallel, there has been an increase in tic severity and explosive tic-like disorders.

Method: We enrolled 44 adolescent patients with tics (ages 11-21) who completed a 5-point Likert scale survey examining the value of various social media resources regarding their knowledge of tics. The survey also examined time spent on social media, tic frequency, tic severity, and quality of life (QOL) using a Patient Global Impressions of Change scale. T-test was used for statistical analysis.

Results: Although 93% of respondents reported using social media on a daily basis, only 36% of respondents reported using social media specifically for information about tics. The most commonly used social media platforms were YouTube and TikTok. Average daily time spent using social media was 5.66 hours. In participants who reported using social media for more than 4 hours per day on a regular basis, there was a trend toward worse quality of life (≤4 hours = 1.55; >4 hours =2.11, p=0.22) and tic severity (≤4 hours = 2.85; >4 hours = 3.32, p=0.213) and a statistically significant difference in worsened tic frequency during COVID (≤4 hours =3.9; >4 hours = 4.9, p=0.041).

Conclusion: Social media use was frequent among surveyed adolescents with tics, and there were reports of increased social media use during the COVID-19 pandemic. Although self-reported interaction with tic-related social media use was limited, there was a trend toward worse quality of life and tic severity and a significant difference in tic frequency in adolescents who used social media for any reason for more than 4 hours per day. Further work is needed to determine any additional factors that may be contributing to these trends, but our results suggest that avoiding excessive consumption of social media may be associated with better tic outcomes. This abstract expands upon the work that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) on April 7, 2022.

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/social-media-consumption-in-adolescents-with-tics/