Mapping Social Identities in Adolescents: Usability, Developmental Appropriateness, and Psychosocial Correlates of the oSIM Tool

Adolescence is a period when social group memberships become central to identity and psychological adjustment. This research evaluated whether online Social Identity Mapping (oSIM)—a tool for visually representing one’s social groups—is usable and developmentally appropriate for adolescents, and whether its indicators show theoretically expected relationships with psychosocial functioning. Australian Year 7 students (N = 138; age range 11–13) mapped their social group memberships and rated group quality and compatibility, alongside measures of social connectedness and well-being. Adolescents engaged readily, produced interpretable oSIM maps that could be coded into mutually exclusive categories, and showed high internal reliability among group quality indices. Higher perceived group quality was related to higher well-being, positive affect, and school identification. Greater relational diversity (breadth across group-types) related to lower negative affect and stress, whereas the overall number of groups showed no consistent relationships. Findings support the usability, developmental appropriateness, and validity of oSIM in early adolescence, positioning it as a brief, scalable tool for understanding adolescents’ social identities.