Serious concerns have been raised about the effect of social media on teenagers’ mental well-being. Meta is letting a group of researchers examine some of Instagram’s data to determine if social media is psychologically damaging younger users.
reported that the Center for Open Science is launching a new joint pilot program with Meta to produce independent studies about how social media affects teenagers’ mental health.program will conduct “independent academic” research using up to six months of Instagram data to determine the “potential positive or negative associations of Instagram use” among teens and young adults.
The data researchers can access may include an Instagram user’s followers and the accounts they follow, account settings and the amount of time they spend on the photo sharing service. The researchers will not have access to users’ demographic information or the contents of their posts and comments. The data will come from accounts based in 24 countries including the US and UK, according to thehave found parallel links between social media use and the state of a person’s mental health.
Béjar testified that seven days before the hearing, 13 percent of users on Instagram between the ages of 13-15 receive unwanted sexual advances. He also testified that his own 16-year-old daughter exhibited signs of a momentary decline in mental health when a user commented that she should “get back to the kitchen” under one of her posts.against Meta for allegedly misleading the public about the potentially addictive nature of its platforms like Facebook and Instagram among teenagers.
"My experience, after sending that email and seeing what happened afterwards, is that they knew there were things they could do about it, they chose not to do them and we cannot trust them with our children," Béjar said during the hearing. "It's time for Congress to act. The evidence, I believe, is overwhelming."