In an intriguing set of findings, the researchers identified links between particular social-media platforms and depression in certain age groups. Their analysis also showed that the participants’ news sources, number of social supports, and face-to-face time with others did not meaningfully affect their levels of depression. This latest study still can’t explain what triggers depression among social-media users, he acknowledges, but it “lets us start to cross off alternative explanations for the relationship that we’ve seen.” The researchers knew the study participants were not depressed when the study began, and since it was conducted over time, it enabled them to see the depression symptoms appear. Maybe “they are using social media instead of seeing other people,” Perlis offers, “or they’re using social media because they don’t have social supports in the real world.” ![]() Perhaps social-media users get their news in a format that offers less balanced coverage or promotes “doomscrolling,” dampening mood in the process. Or, “maybe people who use social media are more prone to depression because the same sort of traits or personality, characteristics or feelings, the same things that make them more apt to use social media also make them more apt to become depressed,” he suggests. This may mean that being anxious or depressed makes a person more likely to engage with social media. These studies often capture a single moment in time and show that people who use social media report more symptoms of anxiety and depression. Most studies can’t prove that using Facebook or Instagram causes depression, Perlis cautions. “Rates of depression and anxiety were very high early in the pandemic,” he says, “and they’ve remained about three times greater than they would be normally.”įindings about mental health and social-media use can be tricky to interpret. “But in 2022 older adults also use social media, and we know almost nothing about the relationship between social media and anxiety and depression in older adults.” Such questions feel particularly pressing given the mental-health impact of the pandemic. “Most of the prior literature focused on kids or young adults,” Perlis explains. ![]() When surveyed again later, those who used Snapchat, Facebook, and TikTok were more likely to report symptoms of depression. Participants initially were asked if they use social media. For this study, they identified more than 5,000 people, with an average age of 56, who showed no signs of depression as measured by a standard screening. It’s led by a multidisciplinary team of researchers from four universities, including Roy Perlis, the Dozoretz Professor of Psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, and John Della Volpe, director of polling at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics. ![]() The findings come out of the COVID States Project, a series of surveys of adults in all 50 states, which began in spring 2020, soon after the pandemic began. Yet a new study reveals similar associations between depression and social-media use for their parents and grandparents too. Parenting teenagers in 2022 generally entails worrying about their use of platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok multiple studies point to links between social-media use and anxiety and depression among children and adolescents.
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