Candice Odgers

The answer is that adults were in distress and parents were dying.

OK, let's go back to that elephant in the room.

Social media and smartphones also increased during this period.

But here's the weird thing.

In our longitudinal studies, social media does not emerge as a major predictor of teen mental health.

Many others find the same, concluding, and I'm going to quote, that social media is one of the least influential factors in predicting teen mental health.

For most adolescents, like boys,

There's no association.

And for girls, what we find is that girls that are depressed go on to use social media more, but not the other way around.

Social media does not meaningfully predict future mental health problems.

Now, despite this, adults are quickly converging on banning social media for under-16s as a simple and singular solution to solving the youth mental health crisis.

And here is the crazy part.

There's not one single study to date that has actually tested whether shutting it off impacts their mental health.

And when we do this among adults, we find on average impacts that are close to or indistinguishable from zero.

I know, there's a big distance between the story we're told and the data.

The National Academies of Sciences, one of the most well-respected organizations in the world, convened an expert panel, and they came to this conclusion also.

OK.

So before you start throwing stuff at me, I want to clarify a few things.

I'm not saying there are no harms online.

I'm not saying big tech does not require massive overhaul.