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

Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

jonathanhaidt.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 420 posts

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#151

Post by thomastjeffery »

alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

The point is not to stop criticizing smartphones.

The point is to be direct with that criticism.

How else can we possibly change anything?

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#152

Post by c22 »

afavour wrote: post #100
alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

> Smartphones give children the ability to bully eachother at a scale unlike any other. No, social media does. I think it's important to be specific about that because a smartphone is just a tool, same as a laptop or a desktop computer is (when I was a kid there was plenty of bullying that went on via AIM!) Having access to e.g. Wikipedia is of enormous benefit to young people. Having the means to easily call your pa…

My kids rock Punkt MP-02s. They pretty much just make calls and text (with t9!) but they can also be 4g hotspots if they need to connect a laptop. They still have access to social media and other garbage but it's not 24/7 and I do believe that makes a difference.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#153

Post by sdfghswe »

afavour wrote: post #130
rcme wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, social media does. This is like the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument. Sure, smartphones are just a tool. But they're a tool used to access social media. Also, I'd argue it's not just social media causing this issue. AI filters that make you look more "beautiful" are commonplace now. Children see themselves through these filter and it may impact their self-esteem, e.g. "why do I look beautif…

> This is like the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument. C'mon. Guns are dumb. Smartphones are smart. It's entirely possible to set up a smartphone in a way that blocks access to certain apps, limits how many hours you can use an app in a day, etc etc. The only way your parallel works is if guns had the ability to selectively target bad guys.

You can also lock guns away, and people find way past the locks. Someone forgets to lock them or someone actively breaks the lock.

Sure, smartphones aren't the problem _in themselves_. But blocking apps is also not the solution.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#154

Post by cauch »

lukeasrodgers wrote: post #108
alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

From folks making the correlation vs causation argument here, I would like to hear their rebuttal to the points the author already laid out in this article https://jonathanhaidt.substack.com/p/social-media-mental-ill... , especially the section on quasi experiments. Do we just think that because it is probably impossible to conduct pure double-blind RCTs in human populations, it is therefore impossible to reasonably…

My rebuttal would be: it is not impossible to attribute causality, and THIS IS THE PROBLEM.

Right now, there are two identically possible situations (well, even more, but you get the jest):

A) smartphone -> depression

B) depression -> smartphone

But the author does not do a good job in explaining why he choose A instead of B, except "it feels logical to me".

It feels like a coin toss. (and sure, the author has some arguments, but they are arguably disputable, more than in other cases where the idea that there is causality ends up being adopted as a consensus)

It does not mean it is impossible to reasonably attribute causality. It just means that the author does a bad job at the "reasonably" part.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#155

Post by thomastjeffery »

nancyhn wrote: post #42
owlbynight wrote: post #20

I'm not sure how you would control for this. I was born in 1981, not long after the Vietnam war ended, and my Dad was a veteran with PTSD who never went to a therapist. My home life sucked and I came out of it with pretty severe depression. I became addicted to computers as a means of escape, and thankfully -- luckily -- it turned into a lucrative career. However, even though my home life sucked, society as a whole f…

But what if you had spent that time on Tumblr instead of learning about computers and playing games?

Maybe they would be an artist, like several people I know who did just that.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#157

Post by uptownfunk »

As much as social media companies like to preach about how they are trying to bring the world together, they are under a fiduciary duty to shareholders to maximize profits by any legal means necessary (including telling the world that their products are good for them to gain users, kind of like what smoking did back in the day).

Remember, your usage and engagement is what drives their ad revenues, it drives their product metrics which get reported out at quarterly earnings calls for shareholders.

The only incentive they have is to make the product just legal enough to avoid scrutiny and to maximize profits as much as possible.

Given this situation (much like we have legislation for smoking advertising, a type of proto-social media, and we have the FDA for pharma) social media absolutely needs to be regulated. It is another form of junk food for the brains and it is visibly damaging our society and our future generations.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#158

Post by [deleted] »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #124
IceHegel wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a period of time from about 2011-2013 where it felt like many parents would complain about everyone being on their phone. Then they started using them too and stopped complaining.

As a parent, I’m seeing a very clear division in parenting style among my peers. Some parents allow screen time with moderation and caution because they know what excessive use leads to. The other group sees nothing wrong and screens are everywhere all the time. My friend circles are exclusively in the first group, from daycare to schools to friends. So much so that at first I thought everyone was like this. Then I s…

[deleted]

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#159

Post by decremental »

alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

It's important to remember that a ton of people on here are victims of the things they defend. It's like Stockholm syndrome. Drugs, hardcore porn, you name it. They grew up with it, they've been conditioned to feel defensive when there is pushback against it, and to come to the conclusion that they themselves are victims would require facing some harsh emotions that many people would rather just not experience.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#160

Post by AlexandrB »

rcme wrote: post #12
nancyhn wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or disconnected parents give their kids ipads and iphones the earliest and with the least oversight. And note the large spike in this graph from 17 to 18. https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_...

Disconnected parents existed before iPhones, though. Why has mental health deteriorated so much since 2010?

Phones are a factor, but social media is the pits. The more I engage with it, the worse I feel in general. It's a combination of endless advertising (whether via traditional ads or "sponsored posts") and endless rage bait.

Different platforms seem to optimize for different "mixes". On Instagram, everyone seems to be selling something. While Twitter is rage-bait central. Don't have enough experience with TikTok or Facebook to comment on those.

Post reply on HN