The impact of social media on young people’s mental health is not fully understood, but Congress, state legislatures and the U.S. Surgeon General are pushing for age restrictions and warning labels on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.
But researchers, pediatricians and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine say emphasizing the fears of social media could lead policymakers to overlook the mental health benefits it can bring to teens.
In June, the nation’s top doctor, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, called for social media platforms to require warning labels, and the Senate approved a bipartisan bill to do so. Child Online Safety Act On July 30, the Children and Teen Online Privacy Protection Act was also passed. At least 30 states have passed the bill. Bills under consideration There are a lot of regulations surrounding kids and social media, from age restrictions and parental consent requirements to new digital and media literacy courses for K-12 students.
Most research suggests that some features of social media can be harmful: algorithmically driven content can distort reality and spread misinformation, constant notifications are distracting and disrupt sleep, and the anonymity the sites offer can encourage cyberbullying.
But social media can also be useful for young people, Linda CharmaineShe is a research scientist and director of the Youth, Media and Wellbeing Research Lab at the Wellesley Women’s Center.
Charmalaman’s research suggests that social media can reduce isolation for children of color, LGBTQ+ youth, and others who feel underrepresented in society. Handbook on digital media use and mental health among adolescentsHe said age restrictions could disproportionately impact these marginalized groups, who spend a lot of time on the platform.
“At first you think, ‘That’s awful. I need to stop them,'” she says, “but once you understand why they’re doing it, you realize it’s because it helps provide a sense of affirmation of their identity when something is lacking in their real life.”
Arianne McCullough, 17, said she uses Instagram to connect with black students like her at Willamette University, where about 2% of the student body is black.
“I know how lonely it can be to feel like you’re the only Black person or minority in a space,” said McCullough, a freshman from Sacramento, Calif. “So having someone you can quickly text and say, ‘Let’s hang out’ is important.”
About a month after enrolling at Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, McCullough built a social network with other black students. “We’re all in little group chats,” McCullough said. “We talk and we make plans.”
Social media hasn’t always been helpful to McCullough: After California schools closed during the pandemic, McCullough said he stopped playing football and running track, gained weight, and his social media feeds were constantly filled with advertisements for home workouts and fasting diets.
“So I started comparing myself to the way my body looked,” McCullough said, noting that she began to feel irritable, distracted and sad. “I started comparing myself to other people and things that I hadn’t cared about before.”
When his mother tried to take the phone away, McCullough responded with an outburst. “It was definitely addictive,” said his mother, Raven McCullough, 38, of Sacramento.
Arianne said that once she cut back on her social media use, she ultimately felt happier and more like herself.
But eventually, Arianne says, the fear of being left behind started to creep back in. “It was a shame that I couldn’t see what my friends were doing and couldn’t communicate with them easily and quickly.”
The COVID-19 pandemic has been declared a “pandemic” by the American Academy of Pediatrics and other medical organizations.A national child and adolescent mental health emergency“More young people were struggling with their mental health.”
More young people are reporting feelings of hopelessness, sadness, suicidal thoughts and behaviours. Behavioral research A survey of students in grades 9-12 conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Increased immersive social media use, such as endlessly scrolling through videos on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, has been blamed for contributing to the crisis. But a National Academies panel found that the relationship between social media and young people’s mental health is complex, with potential benefits and harms. While evidence of the impact of social media on children’s well-being is limited, The committee reported this yearAt the same time, he called on the National Institutes of Health and other research groups to prioritize funding for such studies.
In its report, the committee stated: Cited Laws Last year, Utah enacted a law that would impose age and time limits on social media use by young people, but warned that the policy could backfire.
“Lawmakers’ intentions to protect sleep and study times and prevent at least some degree of compulsive use may well have unintended consequences, such as isolating young people from needed support systems,” the report said.
Some states are considering policies that align with the National Academies’ recommendations. For example, Virginia and Maryland have enacted laws that would prohibit social media companies from selling or disclosing children’s personal information and require platforms to implement default privacy settings. Other states, including Colorado, Georgia, and West Virginia, have created curricula for public school students about the impact of social media use on mental health, as recommended by the National Academies.
The Child Online Safety Act, currently before the House of Representatives, would require parental consent for social media users under the age of 13 and impose a “duty of care” on companies to protect users under the age of 17 from harm such as anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts. A second bill, the Child and Youth Online Privacy Protection Act, would ban platforms from targeting ads to minors and collecting personal data about young people.
Attorneys general of California, Louisiana, Minnesota and dozens of other states States have filed lawsuits They argue in federal and state courts that Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, misled the public about the dangers of social media for young people and ignored the potential damage to their mental health.
Most social media companies impose an age limit of 13 or older for users, and their sites often have safety features such as blocking adults from messaging minors and defaulting minors’ accounts to privacy settings.
Lawsuit filed:Department of Justice sues TikTok for allegedly violating children’s privacy laws affecting millions
The Justice Department says that despite existing policies, some social media companies aren’t following their own rules. The Justice Department on Friday sued TikTok’s parent company for allegedly violating children’s privacy laws, alleging that the company knowingly recruited children under the age of 13 to its platform and collected data about their use.
According to the survey Age restrictions and parental consent requirements are widely supported among adults.
Net ChoiceThe trade group, which includes Meta and Alphabet, which own Google and YouTube, Lawsuits against at least eight statesIt seeks to block or subvert laws that impose age restrictions, verification requirements, and other policies intended to protect children.
Much of social media’s impact may depend on the content kids consume and the features that keep them engaged on the platform, he said. Jenny Radeskya physician and co-president of the American Academy of Pediatrics Centre of Excellence on Social Media and Youth Mental Health.
She said proposals such as age restrictions and parental consent requirements may be well-intentioned, but they don’t address what she sees as the “real mechanisms of harm”: business models designed to get young people to keep posting, scrolling and buying.
“We’ve created a system that is not well designed to promote young people’s mental health,” Radesky said, “but it’s designed to help these platforms make a ton of money.”
Chaseedaw Giles, digital strategy and audience engagement editor for KFF Health News, contributed to this report.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism on health issues.KFF — An independent source of health policy research, polling and journalism.
