Social Media and Your Child’s Mental Health

A survey of nearly 1,500 young people ages 14-24 ranked Instagram as the worst social media platform for negatively impacting mental health.

Conducted by the Royal Society for Public Health in the UK, the #StatusofMind survey asked young people how they felt Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, and YouTube impacted their health and well-being, ranking each of the popular apps on a scale of -2 to +2. The photo-sharing Instagram outdistanced itself as the most negative, especially in terms of body image.

“Instagram easily makes girls and women feel as if their bodies aren't good enough as people add filters and edit their pictures in order for them to look perfect," an anonymous female respondent said, as reported by CNN.

Joining Instagram on the low end of the spectrum was Snapchat. Facebook and Twitter ranked higher; however, YouTube was the only platform with a net positive grade.

“Because platforms like Instagram and Facebook present highly curated versions of the people we know and the world around us. It is easy for our perspective of reality to become distorted," Laci Green, a professional YouTuber told CNN. "Socializing from behind a screen can also be uniquely isolating, obscuring mental health challenges even more than usual."

The study concluded that people are more likely to report poor mental health if they are spending more than two hours per day on social media sites. To combat the issue, the study proposed a pop-up warning users of excess time. In addition, the report recommended a callout of photos that have been digitally manipulated.

Despite the negatives of social media, however, the report also outlined ways that social media can be positive for young people. In fact, nearly seven in 10 teens in the survey reported receiving support on social media during tough or challenging times.