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The charts in this article are deceptive and cause me to not trust the author. Look at long term teen suicide rates and you will see that suicide rates were qu

The charts in this article are deceptive and cause me to not trust the author. Look at long term teen suicide rates and you will see that suicide rates were quite high around 1990, and then rates dropped until about 2005, and are now on the rise again but have not yet reached 1990 levels (I think). So, the author of this piece wants to make it look like suicides and self harm are on the rise because of social media, so where does he choose to start the charts? 2005.

logicchains 3y ago
They also don't compare with other countries. Social media use isn't unique to America; if it's responsible for teen suicide rates, we'd expect to see similar rises across the globe, but that's not the case.
- ergl 3y ago
  > They also don't compare with other countries Did you miss the graphs showing the same trend in the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Nordic countries?
- drawkward 3y ago
  Obviously, you did not read this article.
tokai 3y ago
This. If you go even further back like 1890-1920s today numbers are also looking very good. This whole mental health pandemic is over blown. People had it even worse just recently - and they didn't get much help outside of drinking.
- 10xDev 3y ago
  So our bar of what is considered acceptable is now anything above the levels it was during a period that include the first world war and the 19th century?
DHPersonal 3y ago
The author has made a pretty big splash across the media in the past few weeks and has received some pretty damning criticism for his cherry-picking of stats, enough for me to doubt his claims as being accurate.
haswell 3y ago
On the one hand, I can see how starting the graph in 2005 feels misleading. On the other, past high rates don’t necessarily invalidate theories about the current spike. Another way to frame this is that whatever factors were leading to teen suicides in the early 90s improved. The question now is: are the same factors in play? The fact that rates were higher is not by itself a good reason to conclude that Haidt’s theory is wrong. The world has changed drastically, and a new upward trend is still a problem even if it never reaches previous highs. At a minimum, it indicates that something is going in the wrong direction after apparently going in the right direction for awhile. Could the current trend be caused by the same factors in 1990s? Possible, but it’s also possible that social media is the problem in the same way airplanes cause global pandemics. Even if the reasons are the old ones, we have a new operating environment to contend with.
- makeitdouble 3y ago
  It would be a fine question to ask, if the rest of the rethoric wasn't so biased and lacking imagination. Haidt isn't looking into what actually happened during these periods, he's just throwing his hands in the airs preaching "I can’t see a causal path linking X with Y outside of social media". A lot of things have been happening all around the globe that were also fundamentally different from the past, including sensitivity to corruption and awareness of global warning, which younger generation could arguably be more prone to take seriously. A lack of clear link can't just be brushed off as a proof of irrelevance of the other probable causes.
  - B56c 3y ago
    I like how you had to replace part of Haidt's statement with meaningless variables X and Y because it actually does a great job showing the absurdity of Odgers' suggested causes in the context all the data. Once again: "I just can’t see a causal path by which America’s school shootings, lockdown drills, poverty, or racism caused girls in Australia to suddenly start self-harming or dying by suicide at the same time as so many American girls." Do you really think Haidt is lazily missing a causal link here? Or is he maybe a thoughtful researcher who genuinely can't square this circle?

logicchains 3y ago

They also don't compare with other countries. Social media use isn't unique to America; if it's responsible for teen suicide rates, we'd expect to see similar rises across the globe, but that's not the case.

ergl 3y ago
> They also don't compare with other countries Did you miss the graphs showing the same trend in the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Nordic countries?
drawkward 3y ago
Obviously, you did not read this article.

tokai 3y ago

This. If you go even further back like 1890-1920s today numbers are also looking very good. This whole mental health pandemic is over blown. People had it even worse just recently - and they didn't get much help outside of drinking.

10xDev 3y ago
So our bar of what is considered acceptable is now anything above the levels it was during a period that include the first world war and the 19th century?

DHPersonal 3y ago

The author has made a pretty big splash across the media in the past few weeks and has received some pretty damning criticism for his cherry-picking of stats, enough for me to doubt his claims as being accurate.

haswell 3y ago

On the one hand, I can see how starting the graph in 2005 feels misleading. On the other, past high rates don’t necessarily invalidate theories about the current spike. Another way to frame this is that whatever factors were leading to teen suicides in the early 90s improved. The question now is: are the same factors in play? The fact that rates were higher is not by itself a good reason to conclude that Haidt’s theory is wrong. The world has changed drastically, and a new upward trend is still a problem even if it never reaches previous highs. At a minimum, it indicates that something is going in the wrong direction after apparently going in the right direction for awhile. Could the current trend be caused by the same factors in 1990s? Possible, but it’s also possible that social media is the problem in the same way airplanes cause global pandemics. Even if the reasons are the old ones, we have a new operating environment to contend with.

makeitdouble 3y ago
It would be a fine question to ask, if the rest of the rethoric wasn't so biased and lacking imagination. Haidt isn't looking into what actually happened during these periods, he's just throwing his hands in the airs preaching "I can’t see a causal path linking X with Y outside of social media". A lot of things have been happening all around the globe that were also fundamentally different from the past, including sensitivity to corruption and awareness of global warning, which younger generation could arguably be more prone to take seriously. A lack of clear link can't just be brushed off as a proof of irrelevance of the other probable causes.
- B56c 3y ago
  I like how you had to replace part of Haidt's statement with meaningless variables X and Y because it actually does a great job showing the absurdity of Odgers' suggested causes in the context all the data. Once again: "I just can’t see a causal path by which America’s school shootings, lockdown drills, poverty, or racism caused girls in Australia to suddenly start self-harming or dying by suicide at the same time as so many American girls." Do you really think Haidt is lazily missing a causal link here? Or is he maybe a thoughtful researcher who genuinely can't square this circle?