(1) This study is specifically NOT making the claim "social media is definitely fine and good for kids," so really more like skepticism at anyone trying to draw a conclusion of "...and therefore we should let Instagram off the hook :)"
and
(2) There is a reasonable case to be made that a lot of adults say that social media makes them miserable, and therefore that probably extends to kids too, if not even more so.
Like, for example, stuff about teen suicides that are linked to various happenings on social media: it's true that those happen. It's also true that teen suicide rates are higher now than they were a few decades ago. It's not definitively true that they happen in higher numbers than they would've without social media (e.g., teen bullying just has a new outlet), but it's also fair to suspect that there might possibly maybe be a connection, even an indirect one.
No single study is definitive, including this one!
Instagram starts off the hook by default. If there's no evidence it's causing a problem, then there's no hook for it to be let off to begin with.
> No single study is definitive, including this one!
We default to the null hypothesis of no effect. It's not good scientific practice to assume a thing is true and then assert (for any study) that because it's just one study it can't convince you otherwise. This particular paper is at any rate not a study at all, it's a meta-analysis. So what it's saying is that they reviewed a lot of research and there's no evidence.
This is a very long way of saying "I already believe it's true from anecdotal evidence and so will viscously critique anything that doesn't agree with my position."
This paper can be wrong, but you're clearly not open to even the possibility that it's not.
The comment you're replying to is shorter than my original comment where I spitballed five different hypothetical scenarios to explain why the the paper's conclusion could be true?
I think there's a solid chance it's true. I also think it's interesting that there's a discrepancy between studies like this and public perception of social media (i.e., that it's bad for kids). So I enjoy trying to feel out that discrepancy and what might be causing it.
Which is why I said it reads like copium. It seems like you have an unwavering position that social media is bad for people's emotional states and mental health. And when presented some new evidence that challenges this belief your immediate response was to come up with a bunch of ways your core belief could still hold given the new evidence.
That to me isn't coming at it with an open mind or with curiosity. Is it not interesting that there's maybe a different larger effect that explains people's observations?
The idea that there's maybe a different larger effect is precisely what's interesting to me! Maybe I failed to communicate that effectively. (I'm feeling a little under the weather today, which never helps.) But I'll also point back to the final line of my first comment:
And maybe none of those are true! But I'm curious to see if there's something unexpected going on.
(1) This study is specifically NOT making the claim "social media is definitely fine and good for kids," so really more like skepticism at anyone trying to draw a conclusion of "...and therefore we should let Instagram off the hook :)"
and
(2) There is a reasonable case to be made that a lot of adults say that social media makes them miserable, and therefore that probably extends to kids too, if not even more so.
Like, for example, stuff about teen suicides that are linked to various happenings on social media: it's true that those happen. It's also true that teen suicide rates are higher now than they were a few decades ago. It's not definitively true that they happen in higher numbers than they would've without social media (e.g., teen bullying just has a new outlet), but it's also fair to suspect that there might possibly maybe be a connection, even an indirect one.
No single study is definitive, including this one!