The level of literacy around the fact that these images are highly curated and often digitally altered is really variable. Teens are still developing an understanding of marketing intent and the amount of affection and curation that goes into images in any kind of post, really. How is the experience of viewing images on Instagram, Snapchat, or TikTok different from consuming them in magazines? It’s a bit like animals whose shells are still growing to protect them it’s a really vulnerable time. As an older adult, there are a number of things in your life that you can achieve that can put appearance in the background or balance out a negative experience, but when you’re 14, you don’t have that. Then, you bring those characteristics together with younger people who are developing their identity. So, that becomes very impactful.Īnd then there’s the fact that there’s a real blurring between corporate interests and individual interests. In a conceptualization where you are only worth what your picture is, that’s a direct reflection of your worth as a person. Obviously, you always hope that feedback is going to be positive, but every young person knows that that’s not always the case, either because they themselves have gotten negative feedback or because they’ve witnessed someone receiving negative feedback. These apps are also highly interactive-one of the points of posting is to get feedback. Both of those things orient you towards thinking that your appearance is a really important piece of you-if you’re only seeing photos of other people and only posting photos of yourself, it emphasizes that appearance is a really important part of self-worth, which we know is a risky way of considering appearance because intrinsically appearance is going to change over time. You’re only consuming pictures and you’re also invited to only produce pictures of yourself. In my opinion, which is supported by data, there are a lot of things that make the apps deleterious: There’s the fact that the more popular applications with young folks are highly visual. There’s a conjunction between what it is about the application and what it is about the audience. What is it about using these types of social media apps that has such an effect on mental health? There’s no doubt that there’s substantial research showing that these platforms can have a negative effect on young people. We know that cyberbullying occurs among young people, we know that for some young people, the consequences of that can be extremely damaging. Particularly in the areas I’m most familiar with, we know there are effects on young people’s feelings about their appearance, their body satisfaction, and social media platforms can increase risk for eating disorders and other mental health concerns such as depression and low self-esteem. I can’t comment on what Facebook may have collected in terms of their own data or how they went about that, but I think substantively around the question of whether or not these and other platforms are related to negative mental health impacts-particularly among young people-we know from a lot of independent research that that has been shown to be the case. What did you make of the findings about the negative effects of Instagram obtained by The Wall Street Journal? “It’s a bit like animals whose shells are still growing to protect them it’s a really vulnerable time,” she says.īut, Rodgers says, there is a way to engage with these social platforms in a more balanced, healthier way. At the same time, the adolescents drawn to them are still developing their sense of identity. The highly visual nature of social media platforms favored by younger people-TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram-put a social premium on appearance, says Rodgers, who studies sociocultural influences on body image and eating concerns. The effect may have as much to do with the mechanics of the app itself as with its audience, says Rachel Rodgers, associate professor of applied psychology at Northeastern. “Thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse,” Facebook researchers wrote in the presentation about the negative effects of Instagram, according to the Journal. Since at least March 2020, Facebook officials have known that Instagram-the photo-sharing app owned by Facebook, Inc.-has the power to make teenagers feel worse about their bodies, according to an internal report obtained by The Wall Street Journal. Photo by Adam Glanzman/Northeastern University Rachel Rodgers is associate professor of applied psychology in the Bouvé College of Health Sciences at Northeastern.
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