Every generation of parents finds villains to blame for what they perceive as the problem with kids these days, and in 2024, it seems like parents want to blame social media for any and all teen mental health problems.
That’s an exaggeration, of course, but consider this:
1950s: Rock ‘n roll was the villain.
1960s: The flower power youth movement was villainous.
1970s-90s: Television will rot your brain.
1990s-2000s: Those video games will rot your brain.
2010s-now: Smartphones and especially social media are the root of all evil and are also everything that’s wrong with Millennials and Gen Z.
We understand, especially about smartphones and social media. According to virtually all the mental health experts, we’re in the middle of a youth and teen mental health crisis. It’s easy to cast smartphones and social media as the villains, because the timeline makes sense. We collected the statistical data below – all on youth, high school students, and young adults – from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the 2023 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (2023 YRBS), and the Pew Research Group.
Timeline: Why People Blame Social Media/New Media for The Youth Mental Health Crisis
- 2007: the first smartphone – the iPhone – released.
- 2008: Facebook begins to grow in popularity.
- 2010:
- Mental health issues – including suicide rates – begin to increase among teens.
- 75% of teens have cell phones
- Instagram released
- 2014:
- 73% of teens have smartphones
- 92% of teens use the internet daily
- 2011-2017:
- Smartphones in homes with children increase from 41% – 95%
- Tablets in homes with children increase from 8% – 78%
- Kids with their own tablet increase from <1% – 42%
- 2018:
- TikTok released in U.S.
- 2007-2021:
- Suicide rates for people 10-24 increased by 64%
- 2011-2021:
- Depressive symptoms among high school students increased by 50%
- High school students who seriously considered suicide increased 20%
- High school students who made a suicide plan increased by 16%
- Suicide attempts among high school students increased 9%
- 2021:
- Suicide second leading cause of death for people 10-24
- For people 10-14. 15-19, and 20-24, suicide among top 4 causes of death
- 29% of high school students say they have poor mental health
- 2021:
- 90% of people in U.S have smartphone
- 95% of teens have smartphones
- 90% have desktop or laptop computers
- 97% of teens say they use the internet daily
- 46% of teens say they’re online almost constantly
At first glance, it’s easy to blame social media and new media. The increase in mental health problems and suicide among youth and teens mirrors the advent of smartphones and social medial and the nearly universal uptake of both technologies by youth and adults in the U.S. and worldwide.
In 2024, 93 percent of people 18-29 in U.S. use YouTube, 67 percent use Facebook, 78 percent use Instagram, and 62 percent use TikTok.
But are smartphones, social media, and the internet really the cause of the youth mental health crisis?
Social Media and Teen Mental Health: Is There Research on That?
With the significant amount of attention directed toward the negative impact of social media on youth mental health, it’s logical to think a large body of research already exists on the topic. However, in the report “Social Media and Youth Mental Health: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory,” the Surgeon General indicates otherwise:
“Despite the widespread use among children and adolescents, robust independent safety analyses on the impact of social media on youth have not yet been conducted. There are increasing concerns among researchers, parents and caregivers, young people, healthcare experts, and others about the impact of social media on youth mental health.”
In 2015, what we knew about the impact of social media was that some behavior on Facebook and Instagram increased likelihood of depression, poor mental health outcomes, negative body image, and eating disorders for a specific demographic group:
- Pre-adolescent and adolescent girls
- History of mental health challenges
- Heavy social media users, i.e. over three hours per day
- Frequently engage in negative self-comparison, i.e. seeing images/posts that result in view feeling less than the poster
Since then, we’ve learned more. For the rest of this article, we’ll draw on resources provided in the Surgeon General’s Advisory, Common Sense Media, and the study “The Impact of Social Media on the Mental Health of Adolescents and Young Adults: A Systematic Review.”
Social Media and Teen Mental Health: What the Research Says
We’ll start with something we should all understand, so that we don’t make the mistake of blaming social media for everything wrong with kids today:
There is broad agreement among the scientific community that social media has the potential to both benefit and harm children and adolescents.
Now for some general facts about teens and social media, which will set the stage for detailed information below. According to the American Psychological Association (APA), an array of interrelated factors shape the influence of social media on youth and adolescent mental health, including:
- Time spent using social media
- Content they consume/encounter on social media
- Type of activity they engage in on social media
- Type of interactions they have on social media
- How much social media use disrupts sleep and physical activity
Research indicates regular social media use may cause changes in brain structure in the following areas:
- Amygdala, which is involved in emotion, reward, emotional learning, and behavior)
- Prefrontal cortex, which is involved in decision making, impulse control, regulating emotion, and managing social behavior
A study published in 2022 on the general impact of social media on teen mental health showed:
- Decrease in life satisfaction for girls 11-13
- Decrease in life satisfaction for boys 14-15
Now let’s look at what the new generation of research says about the specific harms associated with social media use.
Latest Research: Social Media Mental Health Harms
- Teens who spend more than 3 hours a day on social media show:
- 100% increased risk of depressive symptoms
- 100% increased risk of symptoms of anxiety
- Among college students, the rollout of a new social media platform was associated with:
- 9% increase in depressive symptoms
- 12% increase in symptoms of anxiety
- Adolescent girls who frequently use social media are at increased risk of:
- Depression related to cyber-bullying
- Disordered eating and body image problems
- Excess social media use is associated with low quality sleep
- A study in the U.K. found associations between high levels of computer, TV, and gaming from ages 12-15 and psychosis at age 23, but the associations disappeared when controlling for mental health issues at age 12.
- A study on 14-year-olds showed excess social media use predicted:
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Low self-esteem
- Experiencing bullying/harassment
- Pressure to behave in specific ways, i.e. peer pressure
That’s a good summary of the data on harms associated with general, excessive social media use, which means spending more than three hours a day on social media. For reference, evidence shows that in 2021, 8th and 10th graders spent an average of 3.5 hours a day on social media.
Next, we’ll look at the harm caused by specific types of content.
Social Media and Teen Mental Health: Impact of Content
- Exposure to content related to suicide, self-harm, and risk-taking challenges is associated with some teen fatalities
- Evidence shows that among adolescent girls, exposure to fashion, beauty, and style content online is associated with:
- A meta-analysis of 20 studies confirms the findings on adolescent girls and body image in the previous bullet point
- A study asked teens how they felt after seeing idealized body image content on social media:
- 46% said it made them feel worse
- 40% said it didn’t change how they felt
- 14% said it made them feel better
- 62% of teens report they often or sometimes see hate-based content on social media sites
- 75% of teens reported they think social media companies do a “fair to poor” job working to decrease online harassment.
Before we move on to how we can mitigate the harms caused by social media use, we should take a moment to address the idea of internet addiction. At the moment, there is no clinical diagnosis for internet addiction. However, some researchers propose social media can impact the reward centers in the human brain and activate pathways associated with addiction, which is confirmed by some small studies, and in a nationwide survey of girls age 11-15, roughly 1/3rd said they felt addicted to social media.
Is There Any Benefit to Social Media for Teens?
While parents may disagree that there are some benefits related to social media, we have to quote entertainment icon Will Smith:
“Parents just don’t understand.”
We now know the harms associated with social media go beyond “vulnerable teenage girls who negative self-compare” and can have a negative impact on all teens, and in a variety of ways. The harms are mostly associated with extreme, excessive use, which means use that meets or exceeds three hours a day on social media specifically. This is not to be confused with the amount of total screentime, which may include schoolwork and other enriching activities.
When researchers ask teens about social media, most report positive experiences on social media:
- 58% say it helps them feel more accepted
- 67% said it feels like they have people online who can support them through difficulties
- 71% said it gives them a creative outlet
- 80% said it helps them stay connected to their friends
Teens also report the following benefits of engaging with social media online:
- Social media can act as a protective factor for specific groups:
- Racial minority groups
- Ethnic minority groups
- Gender/sexual minority groups
- Social media helps create safe spaces, offer support, and improve the mental health and overall wellbeing of lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and questioning teens and young adults.
- In a study that measured the experience of adolescent girls of color on social media, 70% reported seeing “positive or identity-affirming content related to race” on various social media platforms
The core lessons we learn from all the data we present above is that unrestricted, heedless, constant use of social media can cause significant psychological and emotional harm to teens. Teens with preexisting mental health issues are particularly vulnerable, as are teens with low self-esteem. However, it’s not that simple: teens with mental health issues and low self-esteem can find support and community on social media, with one caveat: being on social media literally all the time increases risk of negative consequences for everyone.
Moving Forward, What Do We Need to Know?
First, general advice for parents, confirmed by research:
Spending over 3-3.5 hours a day on social media increases the risk of mental health problems.
That’s not screentime, which, for students, may justifiably amount to more than 3.5 hours. That’s for time on social media. Therefore, we encourage parents to monitor social media use, and collaborate with kids to create a family social media use plan that limits teens to 3.5 hours a day – and far less if at all possible.
To close this article, we’ll offer the suggestions for future research identified in the Surgeon General’s Advisory. Studies that address these questions will help us establish healthy social media habits for our children and teens in the years to come:
Do in-person interactions have a different impact on physical health, social connectedness, and mental health than online interactions?
How exactly does social media harm child and adolescent mental health?
How does social comparison impact wellbeing and relationships?
What is the relationship between developmental stage – i.e. childhood, pre-adolescence, adolescence – and social media/social media use, with regard to assessing risk of harm?
Does social media impact neural networks related to motivation, reward, and addiction?
What content causes the most harm?
What are the primary protective factors that mitigate harm caused by social media?
The fact that we don’t have answers to these questions yet is okay: social media is relatively new, which means we’re all figuring it out as we go along. We’ve figured out a lot – but we still have a long way to go. For now, we’ll repeat: the heaviest harm is related to the heaviest use. Therefore, we can all benefit by stepping away from screens and looking toward the world and toward one another.
