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Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

insidemedicine.bulletin.com

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Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#41
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That definitely looks like an impactful year from the graphs there. I think if I had kids I wouldn’t let them on such sites until 16/17 or never. Granted, I have a strong opinion against social media before this data.

How would you handle it if they begged, pleaded, and explained how all their friends use it and it'd be social ostracism to not use it? I'm not a parent yet but I dread this situation. I'm good at denying urges personally, so I'd tell them desire is a constant part of life, we can't always get what we crave. Further, I'd state actual facts about girls mental health, they will see and be exposed to unhealthy mindsets…

> How would you handle it if they begged, pleaded, and explained how all their friends use it and it'd be social ostracism to not use it?

Having been on both sides of this, as a teenager and having saw my siblings go through it, I don't envy you either.

But I can talk about my personal experiences. I was very introverted as a kid, and tools like Facebook gave me a bit of social autonomy and confidence, and it absolutely strengthened my in-person relationships. I know others that feel the same.

Not being contactable via the internet definitely can cause social ostracism, but a reasonable middle ground for me is something like Discord or WhatsApp, which is semi private and avoids the toxicity of The Feed.

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#42
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That definitely looks like an impactful year from the graphs there. I think if I had kids I wouldn’t let them on such sites until 16/17 or never. Granted, I have a strong opinion against social media before this data.

If you had kids, you would know that you can control what they do up until about middle-school age, at which point your ability to control them begins to decline. They're starting to grow into independent adults.

Best not to try to control them before that age either. Best to try to develop a relationship where you can express your concerns in a straightforward manner and hear their concerns and get their buy-in on some solution that safeguards them from your concerns but let’s them have some semblance of what they want.

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#43
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That definitely looks like an impactful year from the graphs there. I think if I had kids I wouldn’t let them on such sites until 16/17 or never. Granted, I have a strong opinion against social media before this data.

If you had kids, you would know that you can control what they do up until about middle-school age, at which point your ability to control them begins to decline. They're starting to grow into independent adults.

Indeed. The best thing you can do is to teach them how to think for themselves, how to think freely, what is really important in life etc. Takes a lot of time and effort but it gives them the best defense against peer pressure and ‘social media’

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#44
This data isn't that convincing, a lot of factors go into this messy correlation between ED visits for girl suicide attempts and covid closure of schools. The title of the link doesn't mention ED visits for attempts, which is the actual outcome of interest here, so IMO the link title is too strongly worded from an epidemiologists viewpoint.

Now conjecturing as to correlation confounders. Maybe the girls need more time at home with pets, family, hobbies, more time in their yard, less time exposed to commuting and classes they don't want to take or people they don't want to see. School is such a diverse set of stressors and the data here isn't clear to begin with...

A more verified takeaway is that girls attempted suicide around 2X more often than boys. This we know has something to do with technology and social media, whereas the schools opening is still potentially spuriously linked.

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#45

“ In writing this, I have found the surprising reverse correlation between suicidal behavior and time spent in school—both prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and during it—gnawing at me. Could it be that the pressures around school itself are among the most important stressors related to suicidality among teens? If that’s so, the underlying reasons could be related either to academic or social pressures. Regardless, no o…

What is supposed to be meant by "reverse correlation"? Correlation is a symmetric phenomenon, and the final part of the quote makes it clear that the correlation between these two behaviors is positive, not negative: > more time spent in the classroom appears to be associated with increased rates of attempted or completed suicide.

Common parlance. The assumed situation is that isolation would increase mental health problems and suicide risk. Instead it went in the other direction. To distinguish this from positive correlation for nontechnical readers, “reverse correlation” makes sense.

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#46

Do you guys mind not providing links to website that insist that you they allow you to every damn data collection agency to track you before you enter?

The way they handle cookies is very questionable to put it mildly. Their popup asks if I want to accept cookies but then there is literally no other button than the one saying "accept all".

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#47

reddit removed this link due to not passing media bias.. interesting. https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaCoronavirus/comments/oqawe5/s...

The website the mod linked to is Mediabiasfactcheck.com The article is from Inside Medicine published via Bulletin.com by author Jeremy Faust. I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided. If we want to have a conversation about the mods decision and if it should give us pause, we'll first have to understand the reasoning (or verify if it's even credible) of the mod.

> I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided.

The relevant rule is "Use Reliable Sources" and the subreddit seems focused on facts and statistics. I think it makes sense to default to disallowing random websites not reviewed by the source they've chosen for bias review.

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#48
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That definitely looks like an impactful year from the graphs there. I think if I had kids I wouldn’t let them on such sites until 16/17 or never. Granted, I have a strong opinion against social media before this data.

> or never How does that work?

Poorly

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#49
It's almost as if putting kids in a peer-pressure-cooker environment is a bad idea?

I might be biased, I'm autistic and my high school experiences were abhorrent and ended up scarring me for life. Primary school and college were fine, but high school? Forget about it, absolute bloody nightmare :)

Re: Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

#50
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instagram was founded in 2010.

That definitely looks like an impactful year from the graphs there. I think if I had kids I wouldn’t let them on such sites until 16/17 or never. Granted, I have a strong opinion against social media before this data.

Just like nobody lets their kids do drugs or have sex? (Do you remember being a teen?) Kids are sneaky and resourceful. Harm-reduction works better than abolition; authoritarian parenting erodes the trust you need to effect durable change in your kids' behavior.
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