Commentary | Social Media: The Moral Panic – By Christopher J. Ferguson (Real Clear Politics) / Aug 22, 2023
A recent study found that using social media was unrelated to long-term mental health problems in Norwegian youth. One well-intentioned scholar suggested that doomsayers proclaiming that social media is causing suicide and other mental health problems in youth would need to “reckon” with this new study. To which I replied, in effect, they would do no such thing. As happens during technology moral panics, evidence that calls the panic into question would simply be ignored. Indeed, as far as I am aware, this new study has gotten zero news media or political attention.
So it is with moral panics, and there’s little question that we’re in one regarding social media. Advocates for the panic claim that social media has caused a decline in youth mental well-being, beginning somewhere around 2009-2015 (the exact date, of course, being flexible depending upon convenience). Like many such moral panics, this one repeats easily predictable cycles. These include a lack of curiosity regarding evidence calling the panic into question, selective interpretation of societal data, selective news and political attention, scary but vacuous statements from professional guilds such as the American Psychological Association, and a few “big names” who, though well-intentioned, end up carrying the pail for the panic (and holding the bag once it is over). Below, I illustrate the evidence documenting that, once again, we’re blundered into a moral panic cycle.
Youth Studies
One of the features of moral panics is advocates for the panic claim that research consistently supports the panic when in fact it does not. We saw this as a feature of the video game violence moral panic. We can see that narrative once again, regarding social media. For instance, one mental health website claimed, “However, multiple studies have found a strong link between heavy social media and an increased risk for depression, anxiety, loneliness, self-harm, and even suicidal thoughts.” Unfortunately, that’s not at all an accurate portrayal of the evidence. Last year, a large group of media psychologists and I published a meta-analysis of studies of screen use, including social media, and mental health. Overall, we found that the evidence was inconsistent at best, and weak overall. Better studies were less likely to find evidence for correlations. As with the recent Norwegian study, the best studies do not find that social media use leads to later mental health problems for youth.
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