10 ms·
Teens, tech and mental health: Oxford study finds no link
- madsbuch 5y agoWe have to be careful about proof of absence and absence of proof here.
- arpinum 5y agoThe Journal title is incredibly misleading here: “ There Is No Evidence That Associations Between Adolescents’ Digital Technology Engagement and Mental Health Problems Have Increased” - this wasn’t a lit review paper or meta analysis. Sad that a top 20 journal would overstate the findings.
- timkam 5y agoI wouldn't be too judgmental here. From the authors' and editors' perspective, the implications are clear because the paper is not marked as a review/survey. Sure, it's not a good choice, but I also think it's unreasonable to expect a title like "this study does not find evidence...".
- fighterpilot 5y agoStill need an explanation for why young female suicide is increasing
- yorwba 5y agoIncreasing in the US, but decreasing globally: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.SUIC.FE.P5?most_recent_value_desc=true https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.SUIC.FE.P5?most_... Irrespective of gender: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.SUIC.P5?most_recent_value_desc=true https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.SUIC.P5?most_rec...
- fighterpilot 5y agoThat's all females, I meant teens or pre teens
- ratww 5y agoYou got a link with a reference for that? I'm not doubting you, just want to know the numbers.
- fighterpilot 5y agoSure: https://www.the-sun.com/news/1487147/social-media-suicides-self-harm-netflix-social-dilemma/ https://www.the-sun.com/news/1487147/social-media-suicides-s... This pertains to the US, I'm not sure if the same trend exists elsewhere.
- ratww 5y agoThank you! There seems to be a more detailed documentary on it, thanks for pointing me towards it.
- DanBC 5y agoWe're not sure, but we think method substitution might be playing a role here.
- rednerrus 5y agoWhy not look to society instead of technology?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- anonfornoreason 5y agoRead “the coddling of the American mind”, fantastic book that gives some insight into how we now raise kids to be fragile instead of anti fragile, so when things come up they get blown up into existential catastrophes. Very very good book and audiobook. Haidt also has another great book that dives into political differences at a fundamental level, helps understand how to bridge empathy gap in current divisive political climate.
- polskibus 5y ago28-year long study is too broad, as social media has been available for 10 year olds for much shorter period of time. So the pre-social media effects obstruct the social media ones significantly.
- kuroguro 5y agoThe 10 year olds may end up better adapted than us old farts. Haven't we been here before? TV? Video games?
- watwut 5y agoVideo games are issue for families still. The 10 years old did not adapted that much, their parents had to build knowledge and strategies on how to deal with related issues. It is not like you could allow your kids to have unlimited amount of playing any game they ask for. Same with tv while kids watched tv. It was primary parents who had to adapt, make decisions about which show to allow at what age, what not and how much of it to allow.
- kuu 5y ago> It is not like you could allow your kids to have unlimited amount of playing any game they ask for. You can apply this to any kind of recreational activity, it doesn't matter if it's videogames or soccer or reading books at night. If you don't put limits, they don't learn them. And of course, don't pretend to put limits at 10 when they weren't earlier on. The kids need limits for any activity, but parents aren't always there to put them.
- watwut 5y agoAnd with some activities it is easier then with others. Because general toy makers have hard time to make the plastic cars addictive, it is much easier with video games and A/B testing. I do know multiple families who had issue with their kid (usually boy) being aggressive when told to give away tablet. I do not know family that would deal with similar issue around books. They did solved it eventually, but the process was frustrating and took quite a lot of effort. You are also less likely to deal with someone raging while building legos, while having to deal with loud swearing teenage gamer is quite common. (Yes, in involved families, the issue is typically eventually solved. )
- wott 5y agoI don't know about the study itself, but the title of the article doesn't match its content. It seems to be more about a lack of evolution of the link, than about a lack of link. The article says: "We couldn't tell the difference between social-media impact and mental health in 2010 and 2019. We're not saying that fewer happy people use more social media. We're saying that the connection is not getting stronger."
- pharmakom 5y agoIt must be hard to find a control group of teens not using social media.
- teekert 5y agoYeah and I think that those people are also not an otherwise average representation of population. I.e. if you have the strength to no do it, you must have some special character traits for which it is very difficult to correct the research.
- penteract 5y agoThe title seems to contradict the content of the research - to quote the abstract of the paper, "Technology engagement had become less strongly associated with depression in the past decade", i.e. there is a link between depression and technology use, it's just not as strong as it used to be.
- jeltz 5y agoBut wouldn't that be trivially explainable with that since everyone uses technology all the time these days those who use it to escape their issues stand put less? Meaning the study essentially just measures to ubiquity of tech.
- mattgreenrocks 5y agoAlso consider that tech addiction is currently quite normalized IMO.
- dash2 5y agoFull quote: Technology engagement had become less strongly associated with depression in the past decade, but social-media use had become more strongly associated with emotional problems. We detected no changes in five other associations or differential associations by sex. There is therefore little evidence for increases in the associations between adolescents’ technology engagement and mental health. In other words, "some links got stronger, others got weaker, there's no clear pattern so we don't take these changes that seriously."
- jiofih 5y agoThe study title is “ There Is No Evidence That Associations Between Adolescents’ Digital Technology Engagement and Mental Health Problems Have Increased”. It does NOT suggest there is no link, but that it hasn’t gotten worse (or better) in the past 10 years.
- dash2 5y agoYeah, in fact the basic result is that there's about a .05-.20 ish correlation between social media and various mental health problems, broadly defined (not depression though, it's a zero). And this correlation doesn't change. Correlation is not causation and this study makes no attempt to solve that problem. Note also that if the association is causal, and the size of the association remains the same, but the level of the independent variable goes up - i.e. people spend more time on their phones/TVs/computers - then the size of the resulting problem will go up too.
- aspaceman 5y agoI would imagine that’s a similar level of correlation with adults as well? Between mental health problems and adult usage that is.
- chillacy 5y agoI’ve heard a theory that the causation is in the other direction, where those who are currently depressed spend more time consuming media including social media
- judge2020 5y agoDefinitely need the title changed @dang
- codeulike 5y agoBad headline by the BBC - the study doesn't say 'no link', they are saying the link has not got stronger.
- notsureaboutpg 5y agoAs I get older I'm realizing it's more efficient to trust my gut than science communication or journalism on scientific issues. Social media companies and YouTube hire armies of phds in psychology to make their products as addicting and important to users as possible in our attention based economy. That's going to have a negative impact on young kids. No study out there that contradicts this is going to be taken seriously by me on first glance. Easy, simple rule. Keeps me moving quickly through the news each day
- kingsuper20 5y agoI agree. Any time I see a study on use of this technology, particularly mobile, that differs from studies on gambling machine addiction, the cynic in me takes over. Admittedly, gambling money is different than gambling social status, but I'm not quite sure how.
- theontheone 5y agoI don't even need to read the article to know that the implied clickbait is wrong.
- Bancakes 5y agoThere is no correlation? How about the causation of dopamine hits caused by videogames and social media? Where do all the adhd misdiagnoses come from?
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tester34 5y agoOne thing that's really interesting for me is that on websites with a lot of US users, there's a LOT of talk about ADHD basically whenever any not-physicall problem/illness is being discussed, then probability of somebody mentioning ADHD goes to 100% but why? or maybe it's that my country is somewhat backwards and is not used as the reason this often
- Ensorceled 5y ago> or maybe it's that my country is somewhat backwards and is not used as the reason this often Please don't dismiss mental illness here.
- tester34 5y agoI don't, I meant that ADHD isn't the only mental illness out there.
- bobthechef 5y agoNo, the mental health field is definitely a mixed bag. The concept of mental illness deserves close inspection. For example, you can speak of mental illness as an objective disorder of the psyche. On the other, you can speak of mental illness as the pathologizing of immoral behavior as illness, or even moral behavior that departs from prevailing cultural expectations or the preferences of the powerful, and still further objective mental illness resulting from cultural expectations or the preferences of the powerful. (A curious side effect of any metaphysical stance that denies the reality of function, a teleological concept, is that you have no objective reference by which to adjudicate. So you are generally left with either cultural expectation, preferences of the powerful, or personal preferences, which undermines the very idea of mental illness as such.) People are easily attracted to the pathologizing of their discontents because it appears to offer an explanation and possibly something to blame. Of course, the relief one feels is not necessarily an indication that the belief is true. It may only be a distraction from the root cause which may in fact be moral (immoral behavior can generate mental illness) or cultural (living according to a consumerist ethos and its mental health effects).
- 02020202 5y agojust the title itself is utter bs
- anotha1 5y agoSadly, social media is the new smoking. I encourage everyone to read "the book of why" by Judea Pearl. It illustrates how "research" and "studies" were used to sew doubt about the dangers of smoking. That's where we're at with social media, BUT, we have new tools like causal inference that should decrease the length of time we deal with "no link found here" or "correlation is not causation" bs.
- Siira 5y agoStill, we do not know if these studies were manipulated by the industry or how much. We have no evidence except them. Cynicism is not a substitute for actual evidence.
- forrestgumbc 5y agoI agree — if you think there were faults in the methodology: fair, point them out. But to cast doubt on a paper simply because "we don't know how these were manipulated" is a lazy effort to disregard conclusions that don't fall on preconceived notions.
- CaptArmchair 5y agoAs far as this particular study goes: Unlike the industry funded research you implicitly refer to (tobacco, fossil fuel,...), this study was done by a department of the University of Oxford, which is publicly funded. The title from actual press release / news item from their website reads this: > Study suggests little to no increase over time in association between adolescents’ technology engagement and mental health problems, urges more transparent collaborations between academia and industry The second part wasn't mentioned in the BBC article and pretty much addresses your concern. From the press release: > To enable a robust study of life in the digital age, the authors suggested an urgent need for more credible and transparent collaborations between technology companies and independent scientists. > “We need more transparent and credible collaborations between scientists and technology companies to unlock the answers. The data exists within the tech industry, scientists just need to be able to access it for neutral and independent investigation.” https://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/news/releases/study-suggests-little-to-no-increase-over-time-in-association-between-adolescents-technology-engagement-and-mental-health-problems-urges-more-transparent-collaborations-between-academia-and/ https://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/news/releases/study-suggests-little...
- ppf 5y agoI have worked hard to wean myself off the harmful effects of (mostly social) tech, and will do my utmost to pass these lessons on to my kids. My wife and I even have ideas like having a wifi-free house.
- sjg007 5y agoI think about this but then I remember the massive amount of time I spent playing the original Nintendo and watching cable TV. That basically changed when I got basic dial up and a computer which I spent a lot of time disassembling and rebuilding both at the hardware and software level. So today my kids play roblox, minecraft and watch youtube. And they do this while facetiming their friends. My kids will build crazy boats and structures in both roblox and minecraft. They have zero interest in regular tv as far as I can tell. They'd rather watch people play roblox/minecraft or mashups of the simpson's on youtube then tv.
- fareesh 5y agoIs it tech or social media? Many of us used computers as teenagers - I don't think it did any damage.
- agumonkey 5y agoI'd draw a line before and after constant connection and social media web2.0. Tech felt like a chunk of your life before, now it feels central, infrastructural, unavoidable. It's just an opinion.
- surajs 5y agotech don't drive ppl crazy, ppl do
- williesleg 5y agoOh everybody here is really fucked up. The study is shit.
- johncena33 5y agoWhile I am skeptical about the finding of this particular study, I also think social media gets blamed for lot of cultural problems unjustifiably. Being an immigrant, one of the culture shocks in North America for me was how much narcissistic the culture is. In a very weird way people are encouraged to have grandiose self-image in the name of high self-esteem. Social media has definitely excerbated self-centerdness. But the self-centeredness is a cultural issue, social media just made it more visible.
- bluetomcat 5y agoAmerican culture is deeply rooted in what is called expressive individualism. The idea that to unleash their potential, one has to outwardly express their individual feelings, views and preferences via public channels. That is coupled with moral utilitarianism which prescribes that every action should lead to the greatest quantifiable amount of happiness for the greatest amount of people. It is certainly a shock for people coming from more inward-looking, collective cultures.
- johncena33 5y agoNorth American culture is individualistic in theory, not in practice. Coming from a very collectivistic culture, I can tell you people care way less about number of followers and number of likes than North American people do. You'd expect in an individualistic culture, people wouldn't be obsessed about curating perfect image in social media or dream about being a social media celebrity. That goes against the very idea of individualism. What's happening here isn't individualism, it's validation seeking. That's why I used the word narcissism. Because narcissism at its core is insecurity and validation seeking.
- danaris 5y agoThe behavior you describe is validation-seeking, but that doesn't show that American culture is not individualistic. The individualism shows up in a myriad of other ways, both cultural and political.
- 5y ago
- indymike 5y agoFather of four daughters and five kids. Of my five kids, two have attempted suicide (both tried at school). In both cases, they missed a concept in school and the teachers clamped down on what they saw as laziness. Being a middle-school kid is tough, and that extra negative interaction was the trigger (suicide is complicated, and there was a lot more going than the academic problem). So many of the parents I met as my kids went through counseling and group were quick to blame tech. As they would talk through what had happened, it would become apparent that it wasn't the tech - it was the people. The tech was just where the kids were communicating. It was a lot like blaming the highway for a drunk driver's behavior. All I can really say is LISTEN when your kids are struggling. It's hard because kids will hide their problems. It's hard because there's no manual for being a parent, and every child very different.
- TheAdamAndChe 5y agoWhat I see very commonly(and what I experienced growing up) is that kids nowadays are given very, very little autonomy nowadays. Kids are confined to a very small amount of space where they aren't allowed to play, explore, or be out of sight of a caregiver. At school, they are expected to behave like little adults. Rambunctiousness and energy are shamed. Socialization is relegated to a small period of recess or extracurriculars, both of which are monitored. Exercise isn't done on a regular basis. In this environment, it's natural for them to escape to a digital world where they can actually do what they want. When I was a kid in such an environment, I played video games for hours and hours. I once stayed up 40+ hours playing GTA. When I moved out and controlled my own life, the appeal disappeared overnight. With that said, there's definitely something to the claims that social media is addictive. Reddit had me hooked for years. They are like skinner boxes. But it's only part of the story, and different technologies will probably cause different outcomes and levels of addiction. I don't mind my kid playing a Switch, but I don't plan on letting her have a social media account.
- laurent92 5y ago> there's definitely something to the claims that social media is addictive. Reddit had me hooked for years Addiction is exactly that. I’ve had a conf on addictions and the speaker said most people grow out of addictions, even heroin, and the people who die from them are a surprisingly small proportion. She mentioned people going out of hard drugs, and generally from one day to another after they realize the cost it had. Just like you did ;) Congrats, I guess.
- dash2 5y agoI see "fewer" vs "less" has become the new "between you and I". Quote from the researcher, presumably mangled by some illiterate subeditor: "We're not saying that fewer happy people use more social media."
- danaris 5y ago....and...what's the problem? "Fewer" is correct when talking about a discrete quantity (like people). "Less" is correct when talking about a continuous quantity (like water).
- dash2 5y agoBut as the context shows, what they mean is not "a smaller amount of happy people". They mean "people who are less happy". Here, "less" is an adverb, and "fewer" is dead wrong.
- danaris 5y agoAh, I see. Wow, that's a weird enough error that my brain did not flag it as wrong, just assumed that it meant "fewer people."
- LatteLazy 5y agoIt's cheap and easy to blame mysterious outside forces (like Video games, violence on TV, Drugs, Communism and now social media) for social problems. It saves us from facing up to the downsides of the society we have built and maintained. It reassures us none of our problems are our fault.
- dash2 5y agoOne way to avoid this problem is to do research that tells us whether outside forces actually are, or are not, responsible for social problems. That's what scientific studies like this one try to do.
- LatteLazy 5y agoAh, but if we did that we'd then have to actually acknowledge those problems. Take a look at the comments here too see how many people would rather NOT accept the results...
- freddealmeida 5y agoit was never technology, it was ideas and society (social norms). But tech makes it so much easier to over power evolutionary aspects that really shouldn't be overwhelmed. Porn. Guilt. Comparison. etc. Not an easy problem at all. But finding no link seems incredulous.
- vagrantJin 5y agoWhy dont they try looking for dietary causes since we literally are what we eat. As an anecdote, I suffered a mild gloominess to everything when I was a teenager. In uni I stopped eating white bread and voila. What we eat really has a direct impact on our mental health so there is a lever to pull rather than the pie in the sky claims of technology causing people anguish.
- SketchySeaBeast 5y agoWhile I'm happy it has worked for you, I'm sure you'll find that many people stopped being gloomy once they left their teenage years, regardless of the grain products they did or didn't consume.
- blfr 5y agoOf course. The rise of antidepressant usage and many other worrying trends predate mass Internet adoption and social networks. We should still burn Facebook to the ground out of abundance of caution.
- chad_strategic 5y ago> We should still burn Facebook to the ground out of abundance of caution. Prevention is the key.
- jollybean 5y agoThe only 'social media' I use is HN because there's 'forced civility'.
- jl2718 5y agoStop calling phone apps and video games and web sites “tech”.
- Sigmoid 5y agoTrust the science and keep on consooomimg content!