I know we love evidence, and rightly so. But I do think there is space here for intuition. Is a life of mindless clicking ever going to be as good as a real one, spent in the company of real people who aren’t endlessly distracted? Is a sunset through a lens ever as satisfying or heart wrenching as a real one? I know for sure that I’m happier, my wife is happier, my two teen kids are happier when we’re in the real world more of the time.
>That the link between digital tech use and psychological distress is inconclusive would have come as a big surprise to me five years ago.<p>I think it's not so surprising since everybody "feels" this is true. Making people look where they can confirm their bias.<p>I'm not saying it's not a thing, but I think this is an issue with a lot of studies that look at something where people either do it and don't want to feel good or bad about it or have some beliefs about it being good or bad, e.g chocolate/wine/eggs are good/bad for you.
I think these are very different hypotheses:<p>1. A person's mental health is likely to improve if they reduce their social media usage.<p>2. A person's mental health is likely to improve if they <i>and all/most of their friends</i> reduce their social media usage.<p>Intuitively, I can see why the first one might be false, even if the second one turns out to be true. So much of modern social life is deeply involved with social media, including a lot of the conversation at IRL social events. Unilaterally cutting yourself off from all that doesn't seem like an obvious boon to mental health.
This is one of the problems I have with Cal Newport's book Digital Minimalism, those dopamine fasting articles that were circulating a couple of years ago and other similar movements to reduce time spent online or on a device - there's very little evidence to support them.
Reminds me of similar stories about video games in the 90 and 2000s.<p>It's pretty simple: walking outside in parks, where there are trees and green and fresh air, is good for everybody. Staying inside 4 walls is always unhealthy, sitting for too long, or not being exposed to enough sunlight.<p>But using a smartphone and social media is compatible with all those things.<p>The only things that bothers me in social media:<p>* Narcissistic tendencies<p>* Bullying and doxxing<p>* Political bubbles<p>* Abusive online advertising and influencing, and privacy problems caused by internet giants.<p>Other than that, social media is not so bad.
This study was conducted during the pandemic, when people with low smartphone screen times would experience even more social isolation than those who had high smartphone screen times.<p>Of course when every other avenue of socialization is limited, online access becomes better than nothing.<p>It's rather convenient that the article doesn't mention the study (<a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0165032721003323?via%3Dihub" rel="nofollow">https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01650...</a>) was performed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Clearly it matters what you are doing. I, fortunately, have amazingly healthy mental health but also spend a lot of time on devices for my job. What I do on the device is clearly different than a high schooler suffering from FOMO.<p>We use this insight with our children. E.g. it’s not “no devices” it’s “no consumption right now, you can only use your devices for creation/discovery, consumption time is limited to 1 hour at these times”.
He’s attacking/defining the problem incorrectly.<p>The link is between sedentary lifestyle and mental well-being. Not device use and well being.<p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-020-0715-z" rel="nofollow">https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-020-0715-z</a>
<i>>Imagine that everything known about the COVID-19 pandemic was based on people giving their best guesses about whether they have the virus, instead of highly reliable medical tests. Now imagine that people who actually have the virus are more likely to misdiagnose themselves. The consequences of relying on this unreliable measure would be far-reaching.</i><p>Why do we need to imagine something that actually takes place? Phase 3 trials of vaccines relied on self-reporting of symptoms by participants. E.g:<p><a href="https://cdn.pfizer.com/pfizercom/2020-11/C4591001_Clinical_Protocol_Nov2020.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://cdn.pfizer.com/pfizercom/2020-11/C4591001_Clinical_P...</a><p>See section 8.13. COVID-19 Surveillance (All Participants).<p>A lot of other medical research relies on self-reporting of symptoms as well.
But it doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be a second order relationship. The article shows that time spent on mobile devices and mental health are not link as cause and effect, but it doesn’t disprove that they are not related.<p>Also, time spent may not be related so some types of mental health issues like depression, but we have many other mental health issues like anxiety, loneliness, etc.
The devices in our hand aren't inherently good or bad. There's plenty of good, and there's plenty of bad. The problem is knowing the difference in the context in which it's being used. And the incentives of companies developing these technologies aren't always aligned with a concept of good or bad (ie engagement).
> In an effort to protect young people from the harms of digital tech<p>Any skepticism of these experts is clearly rooted in hatred of children.<p>Less snarkily, I'd like to see more parenting credentials for those purporting to advise me on how to raise mine, as these Really Smart People don't seem to have society on an optimal course.
I don't want to defend social networks, myself have left them few years ago to find more happiness outside, after having found out that there was a reason I lost connection with some people from my past.<p>But i think we should also look at happiness of kids starting from their families, we live in a corporate era of bonus coming from mass layoff, speculation, crisis, crashes, instability, and so on, which i guess affect families and the happiness of the youngest of those families, i think maybe politicians should also stop blaming everyone else except them, especially those who have been sitting at congress for centuries