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Current Research Projects

Social Support

Social support has many benefits including reducing stress to promoting our health. However, many questions remain unanswered. Why do certain support provisions fail? What constitutes "good" social support? Who should I go to receive different kinds of support? What makes someone a good social support provider? This line of work investigates how social support works and how people can maximize the benefits of their supportive relationships.

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Selected Publications:
 

  • Lee, D. S. & Fujita, K. (2023). From whom do people seek what type of support? A regulatory scope perspective. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 124, 796-811.

  • Lee, D. S., Jiang, T., Canevello, A., & Crocker, J. (2021). Motivational Underpinnings of Successful Support Giving: Compassionate Goals Promote Matching Support Provision. Personal Relationships, 28, 276-296.

  • Lee, D. S., Orvell, A., Briskin, J., Shrapnell, T., Gelman, S., Ayduk, O., Ybarra, O., & Kross, E. (2020). When chatting about negative experiences helps—and when it hurts: Distinguishing adaptive vs. maladaptive social support in computer-mediated communication. Emotion, 20, 368-375.

  • Lee, D. S. & Ybarra, O. (2017). Cultivating effective social support through abstraction: Reframing social support promotes goal-pursuit. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 43, 453-464.

Social Relationships & Well-Being/Health

Supportive social relationships have long been known to promote personal well-being and health. However, what does a supportive social network look like? How can people cultivate supportive social relationships? Are some people better able to do this? This line of research examines the mechanisms underlying how social relationships influence a variety of domains in life, from goal-pursuit to mental and physical health.

Friends in Nature

Selected Publications:
 

  • Lee, D. S., Stahl, J. L., & Bayer, J. B. (2020). Social Resources as Cognitive Structures: Thinking about a Dense Support Network Increases Perceived Support. Social Psychology Quarterly, 83, 405-422.

  • Lee, D. S. & Way, B. M. (2019). Perceived Social Support and Chronic Inflammation: The Moderating Role of Self-esteem. Health Psychology, 38, 563-566.

  • Lee, D. S., Ybarra, O., Gonzalez, R., & Ellsworth, P. (2018). I-through-We: How Supportive Social Relationships Facilitate Personal Growth. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 44, 37-48.

  • Ybarra, O., Lee, D. S., & Gonzalez, R. (2012). Supportive social relationships attenuate the appeal of choice. Psychological Science, 23, 1186-1192.

Antecedents & Consequences of
Social Media Use

Social media use has become an indispensable part of our social life. Yet, many questions remain as to how it affects our lives, and more importantly, how to use it adaptively. This line of research examines the psychological antecedents to social media use (e.g., stress, biology, geospace) and its various consequences (e.g., well-being, health, social connection). For example, a recently funded NIMH R01 grant is using novel methodologies (e.g., blood-based biomarkers, passive sensing, GPS) looking at the bidirectional association between social media use and biology among vulnerable populations (e.g., low-income Black youth, adolescent girls).

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Selected Publications:

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  • Lee, D. S., Jiang, T., Crocker, J., & Way, B, M. (2023). Social media use and its concurrent and subsequent relation to a biological marker of inflammation: A short-term longitudinal investigation. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 25, e46309

  • Lee, D. S., Jiang, T., Crocker, J., & Way, B, M. (2023). Can Inflammation Predict Social Media Use? Linking a Biological Marker of Systemic Inflammation with Social Media Use Among College Students and Middle-Aged Adults. Brain Behavior and Immunity, 112, 1-10.

  • Lee, D. S., Jiang, T., Crocker, J., & Way, B. M. (2022). Social Media Use and its Link to Physical Health Indicators. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 25, 87-93.

  • Lee, D. S. & Way, B. M. (2021). Social Media Use and Systemic Inflammation: the Moderating Role of Self-Esteem. Brain Behavior & Immunity - Health, 16, 100300.

  • Kross, E., Verduyn, P., Demiralp, E., Park, J., Lee, D. S., Lin, N., Jonides, J., & Ybarra, O. (2013). Facebook use predicts declines in subjective well-being in young adults. PLOS One, 8, 1-6.

  • Verduyn, P., Lee, D. S., Park, J., Shablack, H., Orvell, A., Bayer, J., Ybarra, O., Jonides, J., & Kross, E. (2015). Passive Facebook usage undermines affective well-being: Experimental and longitudinal evidence. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 144, 480-488.

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