Jonathan Haidt

It's a pleasure to be here.

It's a pleasure to be here.

Well, it was actually a kind of a sidetrack originally. I'd written, my previous book was The Coddling of the American Mind. And it was about how overprotection is really weakening our kids. And we saw the students who arrived on campus around 2014, 2015. I teach at NYU, but all of us have seen this. The students arriving in 2014 or so, which is very different.

Well, it was actually a kind of a sidetrack originally. I'd written, my previous book was The Coddling of the American Mind. And it was about how overprotection is really weakening our kids. And we saw the students who arrived on campus around 2014, 2015. I teach at NYU, but all of us have seen this. The students arriving in 2014 or so, which is very different.

Well, it was actually a kind of a sidetrack originally. I'd written, my previous book was The Coddling of the American Mind. And it was about how overprotection is really weakening our kids. And we saw the students who arrived on campus around 2014, 2015. I teach at NYU, but all of us have seen this. The students arriving in 2014 or so, which is very different.

They were much more fragile, much higher rates of anxiety, much more upset by things they saw or heard or read. And so I wrote a whole book on that with my friend Greg Lukianoff, and we focused on overprotection. And that's a part of the story, very important part of the story. But at the time, we were writing this in 2017 mostly, the evidence wasn't clear that social media was harming kids.

They were much more fragile, much higher rates of anxiety, much more upset by things they saw or heard or read. And so I wrote a whole book on that with my friend Greg Lukianoff, and we focused on overprotection. And that's a part of the story, very important part of the story. But at the time, we were writing this in 2017 mostly, the evidence wasn't clear that social media was harming kids.

They were much more fragile, much higher rates of anxiety, much more upset by things they saw or heard or read. And so I wrote a whole book on that with my friend Greg Lukianoff, and we focused on overprotection. And that's a part of the story, very important part of the story. But at the time, we were writing this in 2017 mostly, the evidence wasn't clear that social media was harming kids.

There were people writing about it. There were a few experiments. It wasn't really clear. So we just had a couple paragraphs in the book saying, well, maybe social media is part of this. But then the mental health stats kept getting worse and worse and worse. And this is all before COVID. COVID made it worse still, but all of this was baked in before, by 2019.

There were people writing about it. There were a few experiments. It wasn't really clear. So we just had a couple paragraphs in the book saying, well, maybe social media is part of this. But then the mental health stats kept getting worse and worse and worse. And this is all before COVID. COVID made it worse still, but all of this was baked in before, by 2019.

There were people writing about it. There were a few experiments. It wasn't really clear. So we just had a couple paragraphs in the book saying, well, maybe social media is part of this. But then the mental health stats kept getting worse and worse and worse. And this is all before COVID. COVID made it worse still, but all of this was baked in before, by 2019.

And so then I then got a contract to write a book closer to my own center of research. I study moral and political psychology. So I was gonna write a book on what social media is doing to democracy, that democracy is a conversation. And when the conversation happens on Twitter, what the hell happens to us? So I started writing that book and I thought, well, let me start the book.

And so then I then got a contract to write a book closer to my own center of research. I study moral and political psychology. So I was gonna write a book on what social media is doing to democracy, that democracy is a conversation. And when the conversation happens on Twitter, what the hell happens to us? So I started writing that book and I thought, well, let me start the book.

And so then I then got a contract to write a book closer to my own center of research. I study moral and political psychology. So I was gonna write a book on what social media is doing to democracy, that democracy is a conversation. And when the conversation happens on Twitter, what the hell happens to us? So I started writing that book and I thought, well, let me start the book.

I have all this data left over on teen mental health. Let me start the book with one chapter on what happened to teenagers when they moved their social lives onto Instagram and a few other platforms around 2012. That's when Facebook buys Instagram. That's when it becomes very popular. So once they all get smartphones, which again is around 2012, their mental health plummets immediately.

I have all this data left over on teen mental health. Let me start the book with one chapter on what happened to teenagers when they moved their social lives onto Instagram and a few other platforms around 2012. That's when Facebook buys Instagram. That's when it becomes very popular. So once they all get smartphones, which again is around 2012, their mental health plummets immediately.

I have all this data left over on teen mental health. Let me start the book with one chapter on what happened to teenagers when they moved their social lives onto Instagram and a few other platforms around 2012. That's when Facebook buys Instagram. That's when it becomes very popular. So once they all get smartphones, which again is around 2012, their mental health plummets immediately.

So I wrote the first chapter of that book, laying out all the graphs, like, look what happened. And then once I saw just how vast it was and that it wasn't just the US, that this was happening, not in every country, we don't have data from every country, but almost all the Western countries and certainly all of the English speaking countries, the identical pattern.

So I wrote the first chapter of that book, laying out all the graphs, like, look what happened. And then once I saw just how vast it was and that it wasn't just the US, that this was happening, not in every country, we don't have data from every country, but almost all the Western countries and certainly all of the English speaking countries, the identical pattern.

So I wrote the first chapter of that book, laying out all the graphs, like, look what happened. And then once I saw just how vast it was and that it wasn't just the US, that this was happening, not in every country, we don't have data from every country, but almost all the Western countries and certainly all of the English speaking countries, the identical pattern.