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Something about this doesn’t seem right Norway also has Seasonal Affective Disorder. But in the USA, all of a sudden with the rise of social media we get such

by EGreg 3y ago

Something about this doesn’t seem right Norway also has Seasonal Affective Disorder. But in the USA, all of a sudden with the rise of social media we get such huge statistics: https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Health/us-teen-girls-considered-attempting-suicide-2021-cdc/story?id=98901688 https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Health/us-teen-girls-considered-a... Moreover, it isn’t necessarily the AMOUNT of social media one consumes that makes one depressed. It is other factors: 1) Body image 2) Expectations 3) New norms of behavior 4) New social norms 5) New social goals add to that the fact that you are competing with the whole world rather than just your local town, and one can see why anxiety and depression can be increased even in those who don’t actually use social media a lot.

jeroenhd 3y ago
I think it's unmistakable that mental health is declining across the board, but definitive proof of causation is still lacking. Social media has been omnipresent for years, it's not a new phenomenon anymore, and the continuing toll on mental health doesn't really coincide with just the introduction of social media anymore. It would be easy if we could just blame Instagram for everything, but there are much worse factors at play. The yearly climate extremes, the massive inflation, the covid pandemic, the housing crisis, the cost of living crisis, and so many other factors give any young person reason to get sucked into depression. I'm sure the changing social landscape is part of the problem, but many other negative factors got started around the time social media took over the world.
- dchung333 3y ago
  These issues aren't really factors in most children's lives. Many of these issues are fairly recent though mental health has seen a steep decline with the introduction of social media. But there are also things that could coincide with this such as the increase of funding and awareness of mental health. Though, that's a hard argument to make for the deep rates of change that have been occurring which often, directly coincide with changes to algorithms and social platforms.
  - jeroenhd 3y ago
    These issues are definitely plaguing parents, and that directly affects children. Besides, the upper age groups are definitely aware of the news and the various crises adults are dealing with.
    - dchung333 3y ago
      Again, no. These issues have been on going for decades now. It doesn't have anything to do with the recent pandemic. Platforms like Instagram are also 13 years old. Many others have come and gone.
0xcde4c3db 3y ago
I'm not sure what explanation you're proposing here. Wouldn't this just as well describe most mass media of the past ~50 years?
- EGreg 3y ago
  No, because mass media was carefully curating its images to children (eg Sesame Street, Mr Rogers, Fox Kids, Animaniacs, Batman, PG-13 etc) and its profit motive wasn’t aligned with an algorithm that is designed to get people addicted to social media. Social media totally changed the expectations for teens… just like selling in a flea market vs selling on Amazon, you’re now competing against the whole world. Actually, there was a profit motive in children’s programming, it was for merchandise, and also had predictable results as capitalism always has: https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-merchants-cool/ https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-merchants-cool/ https://www.history.com/news/action-figures-g-i-joe-star-wars https://www.history.com/news/action-figures-g-i-joe-star-war... Many of the children’s shows (ahem, YuGiOh, Pokemon) were explicitly around selling shit to them, but at least it was external and not about their body image and social goals and expectations. Actually, the best analogy I can give, in terms of destructive power, to the TikTok/Instagram effect on teen girls, was the Gangsta Rap effect on teen boys (typically Black boys because that is who was selected by the music industry to be promoted). And with the same industry always claiming there is “no effect”, while an entire generation started cussin’ and acting much more violently than their parents. Sure, there are of course other socioeconomic factors, such as the rise of single-parent households typically without a father in the home, or both parents working long hours and neglecting the kids. That cannot be dismissed either. But that is also a result of corporations and their profit motive, selling a collective dream to adults (not children) that climbing the corporate ladder leads to better self-actualization. I was there when Sheryl Sandberg revealed her book “Lean In”, for instance, I saw firsthand the narratives that corporate america inclucates in families. Whether it’s social media, the music industry, or corporations, they exert a huge pressure on our society and psyche. Sometimes it’s very overt: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzXze5Yza8 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzXze5Yza8 But most of the time it is simply pervasive, like “the American dream” etc.
naasking 3y ago
They discuss all of these in Section 4.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- EGreg 3y ago
  “Our study finds that if Kari or Knut increasingly like and post on Instagram or Snapchat, they are no more likely to develop symptoms of anxiety and depression. But that doesn’t mean that they are not having negative experiences on social media, or feeling addicted or excluded. Some youths may be particularly vulnerable, and those are the individuals we need to identify,” Steinsbekk says. This goes against their title. I am saying somewhat similar things but expanding far beyond a paragraph that uses “weasel words” to hedge all their conclusions. Their study at best shows that the amount of consumption of social media past a certain point isn’t correlated to the negative outcomes.
  - sneak 3y ago
    Having depression and/or anxiety have defined diagnostic criteria other than "looking at social media makes me feel bad" or "looking at social media makes me feel anxious". You could use social media a lot, and be extremely unhappy whenever you use it, and still not be clinically depressed or have an anxiety disorder. An analogy: every time you ride a roller coaster, you are made anxious, and so is everyone else. This doesn't mean that rolle coasters "cause anxiety" - they just cause you to feel anxious while using it. There's a difference. A lot of people who don't have direct experience with depression or anxiety disorders don't really understand what they are, and assume that they are just a stronger version of being chronically sad or chronically scared. It's not so.
    - EGreg 3y ago
      What are they? And given that 1 of 3 girls considers attempting suicide, perhaps we need to have a conversation about whether this diagnosis fits them, and whether it is a helpful distinction, because that is a real huge measurable statistic “Well you considered attempting suicide, but you aren’t clinically depressed, so…”

by EGreg 3y ago

jeroenhd 3y ago

I think it's unmistakable that mental health is declining across the board, but definitive proof of causation is still lacking. Social media has been omnipresent for years, it's not a new phenomenon anymore, and the continuing toll on mental health doesn't really coincide with just the introduction of social media anymore. It would be easy if we could just blame Instagram for everything, but there are much worse factors at play. The yearly climate extremes, the massive inflation, the covid pandemic, the housing crisis, the cost of living crisis, and so many other factors give any young person reason to get sucked into depression. I'm sure the changing social landscape is part of the problem, but many other negative factors got started around the time social media took over the world.

dchung333 3y ago
These issues aren't really factors in most children's lives. Many of these issues are fairly recent though mental health has seen a steep decline with the introduction of social media. But there are also things that could coincide with this such as the increase of funding and awareness of mental health. Though, that's a hard argument to make for the deep rates of change that have been occurring which often, directly coincide with changes to algorithms and social platforms.
- jeroenhd 3y ago
  These issues are definitely plaguing parents, and that directly affects children. Besides, the upper age groups are definitely aware of the news and the various crises adults are dealing with.
  - dchung333 3y ago
    Again, no. These issues have been on going for decades now. It doesn't have anything to do with the recent pandemic. Platforms like Instagram are also 13 years old. Many others have come and gone.

0xcde4c3db 3y ago

I'm not sure what explanation you're proposing here. Wouldn't this just as well describe most mass media of the past ~50 years?

EGreg 3y ago
No, because mass media was carefully curating its images to children (eg Sesame Street, Mr Rogers, Fox Kids, Animaniacs, Batman, PG-13 etc) and its profit motive wasn’t aligned with an algorithm that is designed to get people addicted to social media. Social media totally changed the expectations for teens… just like selling in a flea market vs selling on Amazon, you’re now competing against the whole world. Actually, there was a profit motive in children’s programming, it was for merchandise, and also had predictable results as capitalism always has: https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-merchants-cool/ https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-merchants-cool/ https://www.history.com/news/action-figures-g-i-joe-star-wars https://www.history.com/news/action-figures-g-i-joe-star-war... Many of the children’s shows (ahem, YuGiOh, Pokemon) were explicitly around selling shit to them, but at least it was external and not about their body image and social goals and expectations. Actually, the best analogy I can give, in terms of destructive power, to the TikTok/Instagram effect on teen girls, was the Gangsta Rap effect on teen boys (typically Black boys because that is who was selected by the music industry to be promoted). And with the same industry always claiming there is “no effect”, while an entire generation started cussin’ and acting much more violently than their parents. Sure, there are of course other socioeconomic factors, such as the rise of single-parent households typically without a father in the home, or both parents working long hours and neglecting the kids. That cannot be dismissed either. But that is also a result of corporations and their profit motive, selling a collective dream to adults (not children) that climbing the corporate ladder leads to better self-actualization. I was there when Sheryl Sandberg revealed her book “Lean In”, for instance, I saw firsthand the narratives that corporate america inclucates in families. Whether it’s social media, the music industry, or corporations, they exert a huge pressure on our society and psyche. Sometimes it’s very overt: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzXze5Yza8 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xNzXze5Yza8 But most of the time it is simply pervasive, like “the American dream” etc.

naasking 3y ago

They discuss all of these in Section 4.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
EGreg 3y ago
“Our study finds that if Kari or Knut increasingly like and post on Instagram or Snapchat, they are no more likely to develop symptoms of anxiety and depression. But that doesn’t mean that they are not having negative experiences on social media, or feeling addicted or excluded. Some youths may be particularly vulnerable, and those are the individuals we need to identify,” Steinsbekk says. This goes against their title. I am saying somewhat similar things but expanding far beyond a paragraph that uses “weasel words” to hedge all their conclusions. Their study at best shows that the amount of consumption of social media past a certain point isn’t correlated to the negative outcomes.
- sneak 3y ago
  Having depression and/or anxiety have defined diagnostic criteria other than "looking at social media makes me feel bad" or "looking at social media makes me feel anxious". You could use social media a lot, and be extremely unhappy whenever you use it, and still not be clinically depressed or have an anxiety disorder. An analogy: every time you ride a roller coaster, you are made anxious, and so is everyone else. This doesn't mean that rolle coasters "cause anxiety" - they just cause you to feel anxious while using it. There's a difference. A lot of people who don't have direct experience with depression or anxiety disorders don't really understand what they are, and assume that they are just a stronger version of being chronically sad or chronically scared. It's not so.
  - EGreg 3y ago
    What are they? And given that 1 of 3 girls considers attempting suicide, perhaps we need to have a conversation about whether this diagnosis fits them, and whether it is a helpful distinction, because that is a real huge measurable statistic “Well you considered attempting suicide, but you aren’t clinically depressed, so…”