3 ms·

Furthermore, when you zoom in on girls, the relationships are not small: girls who spend more than 4 hours a day on social media have two to three times the rat

Furthermore, when you zoom in on girls, the relationships are not small: girls who spend more than 4 hours a day on social media have two to three times the rate of depression as girls who spend an hour or less. The common refrain “correlation does not prove causation” is certainly relevant here, but I showed that when you bring in the three other kinds of studies, the case for causation gets quite strong. I know from long experience that saying "I got this far in the article and I can't be bothered to read the rest" is a good way to get hated on, but give me a freaking break. You have to first ask why those girls are spending more than four hours a day on social media. The obvious inference is that the girls who spend less than an hour a day on social media have full lives and the ones spending so much time there it's like an unpaid part-time job have vacuous lives and they are trying to fill the void with something that can't do it. Social media no doubt exacerbates their issues but, no, it doesn't cause them. Their lives are screwed up and excessive use of social media is more like a symptom.

zdragnar 4y ago
Not everyone who smokes cigarettes gets cancer. If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and give them a device which provides short dopamine bursts at the expense of finding actual fulfillment, you get depression.
- DoreenMichele 4y ago
  If you drink extreme, excessive amounts of water, you die of water poisoning though water is essential for life. Too much of anything can be bad for you. Edit: Let me add: If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and (do anything other than fix the problems causing their stress and lack of fulfillment), you get depression.
  - kaibee 4y ago
    Should we let preteens buy and drink alcohol at school, under the logic that for some of them, the fun/socializing benefits will outweigh the downsides? While this would be funny for a while, I don't think its a good idea.
    - DoreenMichele 4y ago
      No and I cannot for the life of me see where this question grows logically out of things I've said.
      - zdragnar 4y ago
        To be fair, you did respond to a comment about smoking cigarettes by saying that water can also be bad. I've never actually heard anyone compare the two before. This whole thread is becoming nonsensical.
        DoreenMichele 4y ago
        I was responding to this: If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and give them a device which provides short dopamine bursts at the expense of finding actual fulfillment, you get depression. If there is a non sequitur, it's you randomly bringing up cigarettes and cancer.
burnished 4y ago
You really should have gotten through the rest of the article, it addresses everything you bring up and more.
- DoreenMichele 4y ago
  I've skimmed his argument and it boils down to "I have a hypothesis explaining this phenomenon and you don't." It doesn't address anything I've asserted. I can think of several possibilities off the cuff but that's not likely to go good places. Everything I know about human psychology says "Contrary to popular opinion, family life is much more formative and influential for legal minors than their peer group." Edit: I will add that where their peer group is a very strong influence it's because the family has already failed them.
  - burnished 4y ago
    More like "and no one does, we've been searching, by the by if you have a theory drop us a line". If you've got good theories maybe drop them a line? I don't see how your edit meaningfully moves the dialogue - lets say I agree with you and it is a matter of lucid law that poor parenting is a necessary component for subsequent harm to occur w.r.t social media use - whats your point? Does that mean that no harm is occurring or that it isn't important? Or something else? it just seems orthogonal to the question at hand
    - DoreenMichele 4y ago
      More like "and no one does, we've been searching, by the by if you have a theory drop us a line". I honestly do not see where it says that. More like "We don't like it that you are dismissing our ideas and we want to argue that it costs little to act on our ideas and we don't like it that you are trying to hold us to such a high level of proof. It's like a criminal trial here, come on, that's not fair. We should be allowed to get policy passed impacting your children with less evidence than that, geez." No, you shouldn't. If you've got good theories maybe drop them a line? That's a complete and total waste of my time for a long list of reasons, starting with I am a former homemaker and people are very comfortable being extremely dismissive of me no matter how much evidence I can point to, no matter how well I argue it, etc. and furthermore my experience has been that lots of people are happy to both blow me off and at the same time steal my ideas and take credit for them. I will write up something on my low traffic, completely ignored, largely unmonetized blog Raising Future Adults, a phrase that began proliferating in articles and podcast titles and the like after I created the blog and hit the front page of Hacker News* with it and, yet, I still cannot get traction nor engagement etc. And he can then do what all the other jerks on planet Earth do and read it and pretend it was HIS idea and not mention he got it from me -- or, alternately, read it and marshal his arguments why he is still right and kooks like me are wrong and stupid. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009

zdragnar 4y ago

Not everyone who smokes cigarettes gets cancer. If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and give them a device which provides short dopamine bursts at the expense of finding actual fulfillment, you get depression.

DoreenMichele 4y ago
If you drink extreme, excessive amounts of water, you die of water poisoning though water is essential for life. Too much of anything can be bad for you. Edit: Let me add: If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and (do anything other than fix the problems causing their stress and lack of fulfillment), you get depression.
- kaibee 4y ago
  Should we let preteens buy and drink alcohol at school, under the logic that for some of them, the fun/socializing benefits will outweigh the downsides? While this would be funny for a while, I don't think its a good idea.
  - DoreenMichele 4y ago
    No and I cannot for the life of me see where this question grows logically out of things I've said.
    - zdragnar 4y ago
      To be fair, you did respond to a comment about smoking cigarettes by saying that water can also be bad. I've never actually heard anyone compare the two before. This whole thread is becoming nonsensical.
      - DoreenMichele 4y ago
        I was responding to this: If you take young minds which are stressed and unfulfilled, and give them a device which provides short dopamine bursts at the expense of finding actual fulfillment, you get depression. If there is a non sequitur, it's you randomly bringing up cigarettes and cancer.

burnished 4y ago

You really should have gotten through the rest of the article, it addresses everything you bring up and more.

DoreenMichele 4y ago
I've skimmed his argument and it boils down to "I have a hypothesis explaining this phenomenon and you don't." It doesn't address anything I've asserted. I can think of several possibilities off the cuff but that's not likely to go good places. Everything I know about human psychology says "Contrary to popular opinion, family life is much more formative and influential for legal minors than their peer group." Edit: I will add that where their peer group is a very strong influence it's because the family has already failed them.
- burnished 4y ago
  More like "and no one does, we've been searching, by the by if you have a theory drop us a line". If you've got good theories maybe drop them a line? I don't see how your edit meaningfully moves the dialogue - lets say I agree with you and it is a matter of lucid law that poor parenting is a necessary component for subsequent harm to occur w.r.t social media use - whats your point? Does that mean that no harm is occurring or that it isn't important? Or something else? it just seems orthogonal to the question at hand
  - DoreenMichele 4y ago
    More like "and no one does, we've been searching, by the by if you have a theory drop us a line". I honestly do not see where it says that. More like "We don't like it that you are dismissing our ideas and we want to argue that it costs little to act on our ideas and we don't like it that you are trying to hold us to such a high level of proof. It's like a criminal trial here, come on, that's not fair. We should be allowed to get policy passed impacting your children with less evidence than that, geez." No, you shouldn't. If you've got good theories maybe drop them a line? That's a complete and total waste of my time for a long list of reasons, starting with I am a former homemaker and people are very comfortable being extremely dismissive of me no matter how much evidence I can point to, no matter how well I argue it, etc. and furthermore my experience has been that lots of people are happy to both blow me off and at the same time steal my ideas and take credit for them. I will write up something on my low traffic, completely ignored, largely unmonetized blog Raising Future Adults, a phrase that began proliferating in articles and podcast titles and the like after I created the blog and hit the front page of Hacker News* with it and, yet, I still cannot get traction nor engagement etc. And he can then do what all the other jerks on planet Earth do and read it and pretend it was HIS idea and not mention he got it from me -- or, alternately, read it and marshal his arguments why he is still right and kooks like me are wrong and stupid. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009