Every time I look at the evidence, I end up finding that social media improves mental health for teens overall. Is there a new study that motivated this or are we still misinterpreting statistics?
Every time I look at the evidence, I end up finding that social media improves mental health for teens overall. Is there a new study that motivated this or are we still misinterpreting statistics?
A meta-analysis> https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12108867/
Results: The majority of studies linked social media use to adverse mental health outcomes, particularly depression and anxiety. However, the relationship was complex, with evidence suggesting that problematic use and passive consumption of social media were most strongly associated with adverse effects. In contrast, some studies highlighted positive aspects, including enhanced social support and reduced isolation. The mental health impact of social media use, specifically during the COVID-19 pandemic, was mixed, with the full range of neutral, negative, and positive effects reported.
Parent of young adults (recent former teens) here.
Anecdotal, but I can assure you that no-one in their cohort feels that social media makes a positive contribution to their mental health. Neither did their teachers. The ones I know of tend to try to actively avoid it.
I know of older adults (late 20s / early 30s) who have had similarly negative experiences with anxiety and addictive engagement.
My sister does, who is sitting next to me talking to me about this
My alcoholic uncle says that alcohol is actually good for him too.
Is anecdote only acceptable evidence when it agrees with what you already believe?
Why does this apply to me but not to you?
It doesn't, I think both anecdotes are not useful for understanding what's really happening
My apologies. I thought we were in disagreement.
Social "science" be social science.
Not insinuating anything, but when it comes to such a hot topic, and such a hot take, maybe you should disclose you worked at Meta (Instagram) for 3 years. Again, I'm not accusing anyone of anything, god forbid. Studies usually disclose source of funding and sources of conflict, and people disclose owning stocks when discussing economy, it seems like a good idea.
I didn't work there for 3 years (1 year), and I'm not publishing a study.
Should people who post anti social media sentiment disclose that they've never worked on it, have never run experiments on well being, and have never looked at the data?
My bad, I did the math wrong, 2019-2021 is indeed about 1-2 years.
Disclosures are necessary only when something happened, not when something didn't happened.
what evidence have you found that in?
For example here is a recent widely cited study that did not find a statistically significant link between Facebook/Instagram and mental health outcomes, broadly miscited as having found an effect: https://ifstudies.org/ifs-admin/resources/briefs/ifs-gallup-...
They did claim to find a very small link between TikTok/YouTube and mental health, but this seems to defy the narrative of "social" media being the culprit. YouTube was not significant if you adjust for multiple hypotheses, only TikTok
The study seems to say
1) kids with worse mental health use social media more (unhealthily)
2) parenting is (very) important
Ok. Sounds about right. There is still a negative correlation with social media and mental health. So not seeing how this one paper shows we shouldn’t reasonably restrict social media.
This is a conservative angle on the problem: it’s about individual choices (or individual innate fitness) not about dangerous products in society. Not sure why we should ignore the fact that people are profiting of these dangerous products. And that these are man made dangers made for profit, not wild animals that just exist in nature.
Well we don't ban cigarettes
But cigarettes are harmful for everyone, social media is not