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Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

jonathanhaidt.substack.com

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Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#491

Post by fleddr »

lsy wrote: post #185

I think it's somewhat important to ask why this effect is more observable for girls than for boys, and Haidt does not seem to really reflect on that. Social media in and of itself is really just an accelerant for the particular set of social expectations we stack on girls and women around appearance and how that relates to self-worth. Boys have more capacity to transcend social media's focus on image and beauty by fi…

"We" as in a total society or specifically as men do not stack any of these specific expectations on young girls. Young girls do this to each other. The influencers are girls and followed by girls. Instagram is girl territory and all the social gossip around it is girls.

They're not trying to win boys' approval, instead girls' approval.

Social ranking amidst young girls is natural behavior, what changed is that the limits of the physical world that kept it in check were removed, and now we see the fly-wheel effect.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#492

Post by andrei_says_ »

lll-o-lll wrote: post #231
timst4 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Middle School educator here. I can assure you that your daughters will not be alone when it comes to a moratorium on social media. However, the girls they may very well want to be friends with may be very much into social media and group chats. My advice is to be firm but also take steps to create social opportunities for your daughters. I have a 12yo and I host board game nights with amazing snack trays. I help her…

Thanks a ton for this. As a father of a pre-teen daughter who begs for a smartphone every day, I’ve been anxious about how I’m going to deal with this situation. I’d only been thinking in terms of defence, and this article had me really worried. Planning for how to create the social opportunities is just as important. Defence and Offence. I really like it!

iOS has excellent parental control tools, down to time allowance on per app level.

Of course a decision to use restriction would ideally be one made together with the child so that they can truly consent.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#493

Post by fleddr »

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #410
hn92726819 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not agreeing or disagreeing with either of you. However, it seems you say > You are wrong But also: > Many more people would find it offensive ... Is somehow a result of femaleness tout-court But the person you're replying to seems to be saying that if there is some ingrained female-related cause, it couldn't be discussed today. How does the second thing I quoted from you not directly agree with the comment you…

Because the implication of their argument is biological causation , which is pure conjecture on their part. On the other hand, the entire posted article goes at length to study the social impact of social media for young people and young girls in particular and routinely references the heightened effect of the hyper focus on bodies for young girls. Their comment is just a naked assertion. Would people find it offensi…

"But as far as I can tell, there is no causal evidence between femaleness and social media addiction or suicidal ideation"

And yet the charts look wildly different.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#495

Post by 2muchcoffeeman »

friendlyHornet wrote: post #333
mcbuilder wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And at 9th grade it's a free for all? Looking back the high school years would have been the worst for my own self esteem, angst, etc. Glad none of it was recorded. :)

Yup, I was the WORST when I was in 9th grade. I really don't envy my parents for having to deal with that version of me, and I did so much stuff I regret. My self-esteem back then was hair-thin; I use to obsess about EVERYTHING, from what I say, to how I talk, to how I smell, to how I walk, to the music I listen to, etc

I know high school teachers. Obsessing about your hygiene is probably a good thing. But stop using so much deodorant boys!

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#496

Post by _blz2 »

timst4 wrote: post #123
warner25 wrote: post #2

I'm still reading it, but this is great so far. As a father to four little girls, though, it makes me feel really defeated. I can already see that social media has eroded my wife's mental health. I just don't know what to do in the next few years when our girls approach the age when everyone else will get an iPhone and have an Instagram account. I want to say no, but that leads to many other issues, including what th…

Middle School educator here. I can assure you that your daughters will not be alone when it comes to a moratorium on social media. However, the girls they may very well want to be friends with may be very much into social media and group chats. My advice is to be firm but also take steps to create social opportunities for your daughters. I have a 12yo and I host board game nights with amazing snack trays. I help her…

Maybe become a full time father? Dual income is to blame here since parents started thinking schools are day care for kids until they can be kicked out of home for college. Men shouldn't shy from stepping up if traditional roles of mothers are eroding.

Edit: should -> shouldn't

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#497

Post by fleddr »

pwinnski wrote: post #452
catiopatio wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Men and women are not identical; inescapably, the mean value contributed by each will material differ in at least some contexts. If a society equally values the contributions of men and women in all contexts, then, by definition, it must be using an inequitable metric to ascribe value to their contributions.

People aren't abstract mathematical concepts. No two people are identical, and the range of difference between the two most extreme men almost certainly exceeds the range of difference between the most woman-like men and the most man-like women. Given the obvious differences between humans, nobody expects that every single person will contribute identical value, or should be valued identically. However, there is a ve…

Cherry-picked examples.

I could easily do the same and claim that men are undervalued. They are sacrificed in wars, make up the main portion of the homeless and they do the hardest and dirtiest work to provide the modern infrastructure of the world.

They have no support structure, can't fail and are constantly pissed on in culture and media.

Neither of us is telling the whole story.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#498

Post by MertsA »

theshrike79 wrote: post #197
lozenge wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You definitely can report an underage user.

I tried to do it on WhatsApp (age limit 16 in the EU), but guess what? You can only report YOUR OWN CHILD: https://faq.whatsapp.com/695318248185629 Other Meta properties are better at this though.

> if you're not the parent of this child, then we strongly recommend that you encourage a parent to contact us using the instructions above.

Given that the instructions are to prove ownership over the phone number as well as trying to at least somewhat link that to an underage child how exactly could this reasonably be accomplished by someone other than the parent? If you know enough to be confident that a given account is linked to a minor then there's basically zero chance that you won't also know of a way to contact their parents about it. Given the e2e nature of WhatsApp any other implementation would be akin to the "But think about the children!!!" reactionary calls to ban e2e encryption.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#499

Post by theGnuMe »

metalliqaz wrote: post #243
theGnuMe wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So we know that social media causes depression and anxiety and we know that kids will want to be on social media so we have to teach them the skills to regulate their emotions. Most importantly that they can identify when they need to ask for help and will ask for it. We need to normalize asking for help. Right now kids can learn these skills in therapy but that is not the only place those skills should be taught or…

I don't even have the skills to regulate my emotions

So I guess you know where to begin then and that is with you.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#500

Post by linalgmixer »

Adraghast wrote: post #210
mcbuilder wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And at 9th grade it's a free for all? Looking back the high school years would have been the worst for my own self esteem, angst, etc. Glad none of it was recorded. :)

Agreed, but what’s the alternative though? Just going full Amish on them until they’re 18? 25? Look at all the Baby Boomers and older Gen X’ers that got on the Internet in the past ten years and instantly had their brains rotted despite decades of life experience. Should there be some kind of emotional intelligence test everyone has to pass to earn their internet license? This is why I think that taking steps to keep…

Children not using social media is not "going full Amish" though. To use your example, there is no safe age to start smoking. Would you suggest that just because you can't avoid it as adults anyways, we just get rid of our restrictions on smoking for children? Society needs to recognize that social media is a vice and we should treat it as such.
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