Social media is making our young people sick

The strike comes at a very bad time for young people whose mental health is in free fall. This is a real public health crisis that must be taken more seriously.

In Quebec, half of young people aged 17 to 25 have symptoms of severe to moderate anxiety or depression.¹. Antidepressant prescriptions among those aged 17 and under have practically tripled since 2014.

Everywhere, it’s the same observation. No matter the country, no matter the indicators, the mental health of young people has taken a nosedive since 2010, the moment when mobile phones took hold… and the social media that comes with them.

The pandemic hasn’t helped. And the strike could have the same effect, with all the children twiddling their thumbs.

Being stuck at home exacerbates screen use among young people. This phenomenon was well documented during confinement². In Quebec, more than a quarter of teens spent five hours or more daily in front of a screen, not including time for schoolwork.

It’s too much. It’s dangerous. Beyond three hours a day on social media, adolescents are twice as likely to suffer from mental health problems.

This is what the chief medical officer of the United States says.³.

Last May, he sent a very clear alarm signal to push governments and private companies to better regulate the use of social media among young people.

Elsewhere, things are moving.

In October, for example, the United Kingdom adopted theOnline Safety Bill to make the internet safer for children, after the suicide of a 14-year-old girl influenced by content about suicide and self-harm on Instagram and Pinterest.

In Canada, a 12-year-old boy, victim of sexual cyberextortion, has just ended his life in British Columbia. Unfortunately, we are still waiting for the bill against online hatred that the Trudeau government has been promising since 2019.

At least, Senator Julie Miville-Dechêne managed to pass a bill this week to limit young people’s access to porn.

There is an urgent need to do more. The web giants have proven that they cannot self-regulate. An example ? In theory, several platforms only accept young people aged 13 and over. But they make little effort to enforce their rule.

On the contrary, social media does everything to make young people addicted, as alleged in a lawsuit against Meta launched in October by around forty American states which allege that Facebook and Instagram knowingly harmed the mental health of young people.

This is because adolescents need role models. The ones they find on social media are unattainable ideals. Because of the feeling of never being good enough, young people develop anxiety, loss of self-esteem and depression. This is even more true for girls, who say that Instagram increases their suicidal thoughts and eating disorders, according to a study Meta was aware of.

Another problem.

In the world of cognitive capitalism, social media and video games feed young people with instant gratifications that become small bursts of dopamine. However, this is not what provides true well-being, which is instead achieved by using one’s skills and deploying effort to achieve one’s goal. In other words, you have to earn your reward⁴.

But the problem with social media is also everything that young people neglect when they are in front of their screen: sleeping, exercising, socializing, meeting a lover.

It is no coincidence that young people have been much less sexually active over the past ten years.⁵. While watching porn online, with disconcerting ease, young people are not developing the ability to form intimate connections.

All of this can create a vicious cycle where young people, unable to socialize, turn even more to social media as an avoidance strategy.

To break this circle, parents have an important role to play. A role model, to begin with (message to parents who are themselves addicted to their cell phones). A role also for marking the use of screens.

How ?

We can delay the day we give our child a cell phone, buy them one flip or opt for a data-free plan that forces the child to use WiFi… which can be turned off if necessary. It is also advisable to reserve screens for common areas and to avoid their use before sleeping or after waking up.

For their part, schools can make their contribution by using screens sparingly as part of educational activities or by engaging in mental health prevention, like Ontario, which will introduce a mandatory program for the year next.

In Quebec, we can rejoice in the fact that cell phones will be banned in classes starting in January. Finally, if there are classes.