Of the students who answered the 2021 Ontario Student Drug Use and Health Survey, 20% of students reported symptoms of a video gaming problem (Boak et al., 2021).

Another social media app that is being used primarily for gaming is Discord which provides free audio, video, and text chat services available to individuals ages 13 years and above to communicate with family and friends to discuss a wide range of topics including projects, gaming, homework, and mental health (Duvvuri & Kovvuri, 2023).

Mental Health and Discord

See the three findings below that indicate how Discord can be used to benefit adolescent mental health.

Finding One: Stigma that users feel about disclosing mental health issues impacts how much users will share.

In a study conducted by Chin (2021) examining Discord community channels and mental health, it was found that depending on the channel that users were engaged in, users demonstrated varied levels of experience sharing regarding mental health depending on the stigma that users felt that they may receive after sharing mental health issues. For example, users in the #recovery channel highlight the channel’s purpose as a ‘therapeutic community’ to offer support to users who intend to use the channel to demonstrate their progress with their mental health to other users (Chin, 2021).

Finding Two: Personalized Discord Channels are important to obtain data results for specific groups.

In another research study, as a part of data collection by Agapie et al., (2022) that examined the personalization of mental health applications, it was noted that the application Discord was utilized for research because it was already in use by youth participants who were being recruited for the study. The study used the Discord application to capture participant perspectives by posing weekly questions about wellness to the Discord channel focus group of youth ages 15 to 21 years old. Through this research, a demonstrated disconnect between the researcher and the youth focus group was identified as the research team was not familiar with Discord community decorum. A recommendation is that for future research, researchers should choose a social media platform that is customized to a group on a social network for research purposes specifically to define the norms of the focus group (Agapie et al., 2022). Additionally, it was recommended that in the development of mental health applications, the content of the app should be topically relevant to the youth’s interests and situations to encourage usage (Agapie et al., 2022).

Finding Three: There is a high focus on self-presentation associated with more mental health problems and reduced quality of life and the strength of associations with depression and anxiety is large.

The self-presentation concept in reference to social media applications are apps that include the act of posting highly visually focused content on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. In relation to mental health according to to Skogen et al., (2021), there is a high focus on self-presentation associated with more mental health problems and reduced quality of life and the strength of associations with depression and anxiety is large. In contrast, the social media app Discord showed a decrease in self-presentation use in a gaming-related platform demonstrating a relationship between focus on self-presentation on social media and symptoms of anxiety and depression (Skogen et al., 2021).

Recommending the Personalized Discord Channels

Creating personalized Discord channels gives adolescents an opportunity to share their mental health experiences in open and honest ways with their peers (Chin, 2021). As adolescents create personalized channels they are using Discord to better their mental health and well-being as they use the platform for meaningful screen-time while ensuring they are forming appropriate online connections.

Discord already shows promise for applications with youths as they are frequenting the app on their own (Agapie et al., 2022). Since adolescents are frequenting the Discord app it is critical that we as researchers learn to leverage their time on this app to better mental health outcomes. A common theme within this literature review, and amongst all social media sites, is the importance of gaining social connectivity. Especially considering the developmental stage that adolescents are at, fostering social connectivity is a critical aspect of their mental health growth and development.

When adolescents are looking at how to create meaningful screen-time interactions and connections they should take into account the importance of only allowing people in your channels that you know well. Considering how personalized Discord can be, it would be only to the benefit of each adolescent to ensure that they are using Discord for meaningful screen-time interactions and for increased social connection as the research above indicates Discord has the possibility to increase adolescent mental health.

47% of Ontario students who answered the 2021 Ontario Student Drug Use and Health Survey indicated that they have moderate-to-serious psychological distress (Boak et al., 2021).

Academic Performance

The use of Discord in education shows promise for student engagement and participation activities.

Finding One: Discord in the classroom.

There have been numerous studies that explore using Discord in classrooms demonstrating that learners are more active, interactive, and motivated; and have the ability to change conventional-monotonous listening classes to virtually attractive classes (Wulanjani, 2018).

Finding Two: Improved grades using Discord.

In a study by Cacho (2020), the potential use of Discord in educational settings has shown that 80.9% of students felt that their grades improved using Discord. Additionally, in the same study, 98.5% reported that they enjoyed using Discord in their learning and would be pleased to have it implemented in their future classes (Cacho, 2020).

Finding Three: Discord is beneficial in higher education.

Craig and Kay (2022) found that when Discord was used in higher education, the application was perceived as beneficial for supporting student communication with their peers and educators about course-related topics, noting that the two primary benefits of using Discord to be student perceptions and its usefulness and user-friendliness.

Agapie, E., Chang, K., Patrachari, S., Neary, M., & Schueller, S. M. (2022). Understanding Mental Health Apps for Youth: Focus Group Study With Latinx Youth. JMIR Formative Research, 6(10), e40726. https://doi.org/10.2196/40726

Recommending Educators to Create Class Discord Servers

There is established research that indicates that Discord has a place in the classroom (Wulanjani, 2018). This research indicates that as a platform, Discord keeps learners more interactive and motivated (Wulanjani, 2018). Learning to leverage Discord use for academic performance of adolescents includes placing importance on creating personalized classroom servers.

Creating a class Discord server is a way to supplement traditional in-class learning. Adopting Discord into the class can provide students with an extra layer of understanding and resource building that can help them to increase their academic performance. On the flip side, it is important that educators fully understand the implications of Discord and how to properly use the app for the betterment of classroom learning.

Encouraging the adoption of Discord as a supplementary knowledge base for adolescents has the ability to increase their learning capabilities. Learning to leverage social media, and in this case, discord, to increase education outcomes can be an effective tool for adolescents as they value choice and self-expression during this critical developmental stage (Vaingankar et al., 2022).

Page updated

Report abuse