How we use social media, not how much, matters
There has so far been no evidence supporting the view that the amount of time spent on social media affects mental health in young people, says Chloe Berryman of the University of Central Florida in the US. She is the lead author of a study in Springer’s journal Psychiatric Quarterly that found very few links between different aspects of social media use among young adults and possible mental health problems such as loneliness, decreased empathy and social anxiety.
“We do not deny the potential for some online behaviors to be associated with mental health problems, rather we propose that research focus on the behavior of individuals rather than assume media is the root cause of all socio-personal problems,” says Berryman, who compared the response that some people have to social media to a form of “moral panic” such as that surrounding video games, comic books and rock music.