I agree the article you’re critiquing is poorly written and alarmist, and that we don’t have sufficient data to back up some of the claims that are being made.
That said, I can look at my personal experience as a parent and see that one of my children has been profoundly affected by social media, while the other has managed to navigate it without apparent negative effects. Some kids seem to be more vulnerable to its effects than others. I realize that this is only anecdotal, but there is no question in my mind that indoctrination via social media is responsible for my daughter’s current mental health issues. She went from a kid who had little screen time to suddenly obsessed with her phone almost overnight, and at the same time her mental health observably collapsed.
(For those who are wondering, they are both female so it’s not a sex difference that has caused the different effects - just a personality difference IMO.)
My younger one (now 17) seems to handle it ok. She uses TikTok but not excessively. My oldest (now 19) fell down a Tumblr rabbit hole when she was 14 and I don’t know if she’ll ever be ok. She had rarely ever been on her phone, so we never had a lot of time limits because they didn’t seem necessary, and then she started high school and it all happened so fast I didn’t even see it coming. That age group seems to have been hit the worst. My younger daughter’s age group seems to have healthier attitudes.
I agree the article you’re critiquing is poorly written and alarmist, and that we don’t have sufficient data to back up some of the claims that are being made.
That said, I can look at my personal experience as a parent and see that one of my children has been profoundly affected by social media, while the other has managed to navigate it without apparent negative effects. Some kids seem to be more vulnerable to its effects than others. I realize that this is only anecdotal, but there is no question in my mind that indoctrination via social media is responsible for my daughter’s current mental health issues. She went from a kid who had little screen time to suddenly obsessed with her phone almost overnight, and at the same time her mental health observably collapsed.
(For those who are wondering, they are both female so it’s not a sex difference that has caused the different effects - just a personality difference IMO.)
My younger one (now 17) seems to handle it ok. She uses TikTok but not excessively. My oldest (now 19) fell down a Tumblr rabbit hole when she was 14 and I don’t know if she’ll ever be ok. She had rarely ever been on her phone, so we never had a lot of time limits because they didn’t seem necessary, and then she started high school and it all happened so fast I didn’t even see it coming. That age group seems to have been hit the worst. My younger daughter’s age group seems to have healthier attitudes.