Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

afterbabel.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

591–600 of 1001 posts

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#591

Post by 2OEH8eoCRo0 »

z3c0 wrote: post #541
qwery wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But these are communications platforms. While technically true, this is a gross misrepresentation. Calling these sites and apps "communications platforms" makes them sound like they're just a mail service or a telephone. This is akin to referring to a casino as "the town square". > That's a freedom you and everyone else can take advantage of also. This "can" is only true in a strict legal sense, of course.

I see the "town square" analogy used a lot, but it's ignoring the actual purpose: it's an advertising platform, run by advertisers for advertisers. The presumed function of communication (something it certainly was started for) is purely for keeping the attention of users to sell to advertisers. As a town square, it's more akin to Times Square.

I dislike the town square analogy as well. What town square requires membership and provides anonymity? What town square do people routinely share dissenting opinions? The fact people feel free enough to routinely share dissent on these platforms shows that it's the opposite of a town square. The very act of sharing dissent in the town square used to be provocative in itself. What's provocative about grieving on Twitter?

The town square analogy couldn't be further from reality.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#592

Post by batushka3 »

spxneo wrote: post #82

When we was teenagers we had unrestricted broadband access to the internet but what was missing was the constant comparison hellhole like Instagram that is causing mental illness. WaReZ, KaZaA, Ogrish, CD-Keys, drugs, weapon making tutorials, Mail-order-drugs. This was the wild west days of the internet. You could literally put up anything you could sell anything and everything. Classmates were downloading roms, porn…

Internet would be like this 80% if you used PC and avoid social media scrollholes. The infinite scroll of phone app is the adictive cancer. Internet usage with PC is like slow food.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#593

Post by hatenberg »

Funes- wrote: post #590

Social media has ruined society, indeed, but only because the exploitability was always there to begin with. Just look at everyone in this thread opting for letting their kids cave in to peer pressure and dodging responsibility for their upbringing because "past a certain point" you can't do shit about it, and God forbid they try to develop themselves into a worthwhile adult without using any of those time-sinking, m…

Guns kill people but that’s only because the vulnerability of the flesh has always been a problem.

Like guns, we have a hard time coming to the right conclusions

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#594

Post by HumblyTossed »

worldsayshi wrote: post #495
randomdata wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She doesn't share her actual thoughts That's where social media has been most damaging. You can't share your thoughts anymore. The 'Redditization' of the world means that sharing thoughts is met with hostility. No longer can you just throw something out there, no matter how stupid. These days you have carry an entire encyclopedia with you in order to back up every last thing you say and if you utter anything that i…

This is touching on something very important but I feel there's a lot more to it. There's a lot of mystery around this for me. Like why is social media inspiring us to such hostile nit picking on behaviour and ideals?

Being angry and negative is very much easier for most people than being happy and positive. I'm serious. It's easier to complain about the driver that cut you off as being an asshole driver than to ponder if they truly made a mistake and are feeling like shit right now. "Social" media capitalizes on this and multiplies it for the sake of engagement.

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#595

Post by giacovecci »

genrilz wrote: post #571

This is a post in a debate between Jonathan Haidt and Candice Odgers. If you look at the meta-analysis cited by both, Haidt cites one which does seem to show a high effect size correlational link between screen time and depression. Odgers cites 4 meta analyses, one of which is actually a meta-meta analysis, which all claim that the effect size on depression and other measures of well-being are small. I'm not quite su…

Yeah, Haidt's is a compelling entry but sounds too good to be true. I haven't been following this discussion or the studies, but just a quick check of one of the two studies he uses as examples of evidence for harm caused by social media (and benefits of withdrawal) shows that a) he misquoted the protocol (daily usage reduction to 30 minutes instead of by 30 minutes a day) b) the study is hardly conclusive due to major methodological weaknesses (homogeneous sample, self-reporting of both protocol compliance and results).

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#596

Post by drawkward »

ImPleadThe5th wrote: post #219
thegrim000 wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny .. earlier today there was a front page HN post about the federal government mandating safer circular saws. It seemed like the majority of users in the thread were in favor of the federal government mandating technology changes to prevent harm from being done to the population. Now for this issue, there's harm being done to children, and the majority of users in the thread seem to be against government int…

While both paternalism. Requiring safety features on a saw does not restrict free speech. It's more akin to seatbelt laws. It's also made to protect everyone who uses a table saw and not just children. Imo, I do think social media needs to be reeled in by policy. But I can see why it makes people uncomfortable and why there is a difference with the saw.

Which of Haidt's 4 suggestions restricts free speech? Is free speech (for adolescents) more important than the well-being of those same adolescents? Has American jurisprudence aligned on the notion that adolescents have an inviolable right to free speech?

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#597

Post by red-iron-pine »

VA0 wrote: post #531
worldsayshi wrote: post #495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is touching on something very important but I feel there's a lot more to it. There's a lot of mystery around this for me. Like why is social media inspiring us to such hostile nit picking on behaviour and ideals?

Social media is designed to make money, whether that be from selling data or conglomerating it and advertising to you. They want the user to be purely a consumer. They are designed to make people reactive and have a short attention span, they are easier to sell to.the users mental reward system is essentially brainwashed to be an easier target to sell to.

you left out brand-shaping and consensus-building, which is arguably just very advanced advertising. almost universal overlap with agit-prop as well

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#598

Post by giarc »

genrilz wrote: post #571

This is a post in a debate between Jonathan Haidt and Candice Odgers. If you look at the meta-analysis cited by both, Haidt cites one which does seem to show a high effect size correlational link between screen time and depression. Odgers cites 4 meta analyses, one of which is actually a meta-meta analysis, which all claim that the effect size on depression and other measures of well-being are small. I'm not quite su…

"the majority of the evidence seems to point towards it not causing large well-being problems."

I can't see how this is true. Anecdotally, everyone I talk to, and you most comments in this thread (and any other thread) is full of people admitting that they A. use their phone too much B. wish they didn't and C. it makes them feel bad. Again, n of 1, but I've never met someone that openly wants to use their phone more or will say that social media has been great for them.

Admittedly I haven't read the research, but how does it come to the conclusion that social media isn't causing problems?

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#599

Post by fireflash38 »

verisimi wrote: post #506
randomdata wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She doesn't share her actual thoughts That's where social media has been most damaging. You can't share your thoughts anymore. The 'Redditization' of the world means that sharing thoughts is met with hostility. No longer can you just throw something out there, no matter how stupid. These days you have carry an entire encyclopedia with you in order to back up every last thing you say and if you utter anything that i…

People are broken. Perhaps they always were. Perhaps this latest, is the cost of prioritising work over family - it is now common to have both parents working, with child care outsourced to professionals, that may do everything right, but will not love the child. Love is underrated, intangible. I suspect there are very few whole individuals out there at all. Once the child grows, why would it look to family to help?…

Why do you think that childcare is incompatible with familial love and care?

Re: Yes, social media is a cause of the epidemic of teenage mental illness

#600

Post by lucumo »

noduerme wrote: post #418
raziel2p wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a bit reductionist to say it's devoid of purpose and meaning. Have you asked her what she feels her purpose/meaning is? You can disagree with it (I would as well), but I wouldn't assume she doesn't find any purpose/meaning in it. If she gets angry about it, then probably there is something deeper going on. Or, you're just asking the wrong way (if you come in assuming there's no meaning/purpose to her lif…

When someone is obsessed or drugged to the point that you can't have a rational conversation and they're too angry or volatile to approach with any criticism, then it's not really your fault for coming at them the wrong way. Sometimes caring about someone means showing them that what they think they want is garbage that's hurting them. That will probably hurt their feelings, and they might lash out at you for it, but…

> obsessed

I don't know. What one person calls an obsession can easily be called a hobby by someone else.

Personally, I like my little obsessions. I like them a lot better than judgemental people in my life. If someone were to start a "rational conversation" with me where they made me feel like I had to justify my "garbage obsession", well, I wouldn't want to talk to them anymore.

Post reply on HN