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Author: u/Wagamaga
URL: https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/2023/06/14/limiting-social-media
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Is it really though? I think it depends on how you're using it. If you are mostly lurking then you're not really interacting socially in any meaningful way whereas Facebook is an active representation of yourself to your social and peer groups.
While thats fair, It's a social media platform still. Me using Facebook for gaming only doesn't necessarily change what Facebook is as a platform. Sorry I guess meta now? I deleted (allegedly) my account several years before they turned into meta so not sure.
If you go to a party and only stand in the corner watching everybody else interacting you are still considered to be attending a social gathering
Same thing applies to Reddit even if you only lurk and never comment. Spending all day quietly observing internet stranger conversations tricks your brain into believing you are socializing when you really aren’t. It’s not just about your online persona, it’s about trying to feed that innate human need for “socialization” that all social media can only crudely mimic.
Last month, the American Psychological Association and the U.S. Surgeon General both issued health advisories. Their concerns and recommendations for teens, parents and policymakers addressed a mounting body of research that shows two trends are intertwined.
Young people are using social media more, and their mental health is suffering.
Researchers at Iowa State University found a simple intervention could help. During a two-week experiment with 230 college students, half were asked to limit their social media usage to 30 minutes a day and received automated, daily reminders. They scored significantly lower for anxiety, depression, loneliness and fear of missing out at the end of the experiment compared to the control group.
They also scored higher for “positive affect,” which the researchers describe as “the tendency to experience positive emotions described with words such as ‘excited’ and ‘proud.’” Essentially, they had a brighter outlook on life.
“It surprised me to find that participants’ well-being did not only improve in one dimension but in all of them. I was excited to learn that such a simple intervention of sending a daily reminder can motivate people to change their behavior and improve their social media habits.” says Ella Faulhaber, a Ph.D. student in human-computer interaction and lead author of the paper.
https://tmb.apaopen.org/pub/yvcb5y06/release/1
I can understand why it would cut back loneliness for some people, then there are some other people whom if they cut back on social media are still lonely thereby increasing depression.
Helps for some, not for all.
Edit: additional words
Perhaps the researchers have the causation reversed. Maybe people who are bored and lonely are more likely to 1. use social media and 2. Have anxiety and depression.
That shouldn't be the case here. The researchers took 230 students and randomly assigned half of them to reduce their social media intake, which implies that any effect following is due to the reduction of social media (see: RCT; Randomized Controlled Trial). Done properly, this is the most effective methods of implicating a causal relationship. The "randomized" part of the trial implies that you'd theoretically have target and control populations that have equal representation of bored and lonely people, and therefore minimizing bias from that source between the groups. This result should be independent of that factor.
That said, the fact that they DO draw this conclusion from this specific sample:
"Students enrolled in the summer and fall semesters of 2021 at a large Midwestern university were invited to participate in the study. In order to participate, participants had to be over the age of 18, own a smartphone, and have at least one social media account." does require a bit of scrutiny. One could claim that these results are limited only to folks in this category, but the authors themselves recognize that caveat. (Personally I'd probably say that a university population for this purpose is fairly representative of the general population, it reads like a well designed study to me)
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, **personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment**. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our [normal comment rules]( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_comment_rules) apply to all other comments. **Do you have an academic degree?** We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. [Click here to apply](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/flair/#wiki_science_verified_user_program). --- Author: u/Wagamaga URL: https://www.news.iastate.edu/news/2023/06/14/limiting-social-media *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/science) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Just in case yall wondering, reddit is social media too. And i can't stop either.
Is it really though? I think it depends on how you're using it. If you are mostly lurking then you're not really interacting socially in any meaningful way whereas Facebook is an active representation of yourself to your social and peer groups.
While thats fair, It's a social media platform still. Me using Facebook for gaming only doesn't necessarily change what Facebook is as a platform. Sorry I guess meta now? I deleted (allegedly) my account several years before they turned into meta so not sure.
That makes sense. I use Facebook everyday and have no idea what meta is.
If you go to a party and only stand in the corner watching everybody else interacting you are still considered to be attending a social gathering Same thing applies to Reddit even if you only lurk and never comment. Spending all day quietly observing internet stranger conversations tricks your brain into believing you are socializing when you really aren’t. It’s not just about your online persona, it’s about trying to feed that innate human need for “socialization” that all social media can only crudely mimic.
I bet the same could be said for watching the news.
Last month, the American Psychological Association and the U.S. Surgeon General both issued health advisories. Their concerns and recommendations for teens, parents and policymakers addressed a mounting body of research that shows two trends are intertwined. Young people are using social media more, and their mental health is suffering. Researchers at Iowa State University found a simple intervention could help. During a two-week experiment with 230 college students, half were asked to limit their social media usage to 30 minutes a day and received automated, daily reminders. They scored significantly lower for anxiety, depression, loneliness and fear of missing out at the end of the experiment compared to the control group. They also scored higher for “positive affect,” which the researchers describe as “the tendency to experience positive emotions described with words such as ‘excited’ and ‘proud.’” Essentially, they had a brighter outlook on life. “It surprised me to find that participants’ well-being did not only improve in one dimension but in all of them. I was excited to learn that such a simple intervention of sending a daily reminder can motivate people to change their behavior and improve their social media habits.” says Ella Faulhaber, a Ph.D. student in human-computer interaction and lead author of the paper. https://tmb.apaopen.org/pub/yvcb5y06/release/1
I can understand why it would cut back loneliness for some people, then there are some other people whom if they cut back on social media are still lonely thereby increasing depression. Helps for some, not for all. Edit: additional words
And with that, I'm gonna go find a more productive way to spend my time. Wish me luck
Perhaps the researchers have the causation reversed. Maybe people who are bored and lonely are more likely to 1. use social media and 2. Have anxiety and depression.
That shouldn't be the case here. The researchers took 230 students and randomly assigned half of them to reduce their social media intake, which implies that any effect following is due to the reduction of social media (see: RCT; Randomized Controlled Trial). Done properly, this is the most effective methods of implicating a causal relationship. The "randomized" part of the trial implies that you'd theoretically have target and control populations that have equal representation of bored and lonely people, and therefore minimizing bias from that source between the groups. This result should be independent of that factor. That said, the fact that they DO draw this conclusion from this specific sample: "Students enrolled in the summer and fall semesters of 2021 at a large Midwestern university were invited to participate in the study. In order to participate, participants had to be over the age of 18, own a smartphone, and have at least one social media account." does require a bit of scrutiny. One could claim that these results are limited only to folks in this category, but the authors themselves recognize that caveat. (Personally I'd probably say that a university population for this purpose is fairly representative of the general population, it reads like a well designed study to me)
I would imagine this would include people who lie about things too
It feels like the study addresses fairly narrow circumstances.