Mental health experts advise teens to be careful about social media use at the start of the school year

Mental health experts say it’s important for teens to limit their time online and develop healthy social media habits.

By Rose Conlon
SMEs

DERBY, Kansas — High school student Maggie Elliott enjoys chatting with friends on Snapchat and finding inspiration for art projects on Instagram.

However, she says it’s easy to spend too much time on social media.

“I thought, ‘Oh, just one more video. Oh, just one more video.’ And then time passes and I’ve wasted two hours,” she said.

In Kansas and across the United States, teenagers are spending an increasing portion of their lives online—time not spent on homework, hobbies, or meeting friends in person.

According to the Pew Research Center, up to 95% of teens use some form of social media, and a 2023 Gallup poll found that American teens now spend an average of nearly five hours a day on the platforms, with YouTube, TikTok and Instagram being the most popular.

Elliott says it’s becoming more common at school for kids to look at their phones between classes instead of talking to each other.

“When you walk through the halls, you don’t look up and say hi to someone you know,” she said. “It’s always ‘headphones in, head down and go to class.'”

It’s not just teenagers. Data shows that adults are spending more time on social media, too. Maggie’s mother, Sarah Elliott, says she sometimes spends a lot more time on the sites than she’d like.

“It’s the access to news, current events – that’s what draws me in,” she said. “On the political side, it can be unhealthy, depending on what it triggers in me.”

How social media influences teenagers

Scrolling for hours on end probably isn’t good for anyone, but research shows it’s especially bad for teens and their developing brains. In the Gallup poll, teens who frequently used social media were much more likely to say their mental health was poor.

Vivek Murthy, the US health secretary, called on Congress to require social media companies to warn their users that their platforms are linked to rising mental health problems among youth, such as anxiety and depression. He cited research that found nearly half of teen users say social media makes them less satisfied with their appearance.

Experts disagree on how effective such a warning would be, and some are wary of demonizing social media. They acknowledge that these sites often make it easier for young people to discover new hobbies and learn more about the world. Nearly 7 in 10 teens told Pew that social media makes it easier for them to pursue hobbies and interests.

“The health secretary’s warnings are usually reserved for things that are unsafe on some level. One cigarette is one cigarette too many,” said Eric Litwiller, communications director for Mental Health America in South Central Kansas. “You can’t tar social media with the same brush.”

Still, experts say social media can isolate teens by robbing them of time with family and friends and reducing time for sleep and exercise. It can expose them to dangerous material, including content that encourages them to harm themselves or others, and makes it easier for online predators to victimize children.

Social media can also promote unrealistic beauty ideals and has been shown to have a particularly damaging effect on teenagers’ body image.

Sarah Elliott, an elementary and middle school teacher, believes the websites reinforce the way her students compare themselves to one another.

“It’s about more than just looks. It’s about, ‘How many likes do I have? How many followers do I have? Oh my God, did you see what she posted?'” she said. “It creates a different kind of insecurity.”

A mental crisis among teenagers

The increased attention on social media comes at a time when mental health professionals and educators are trying to curb a rise in serious mental health problems among youth. Between 2001 and 2020, youth suicides in Kansas rose 64%, according to the Kansas Health Institute — outpacing the 41% national increase during that period.

However, according to experts, the mental health crisis among teenagers has reached new proportions during the pandemic as everyone began spending much more time online.

In 2020, COMCARE in Sedgwick County saw a 225% increase in the number of youth hospitalized or admitted to a mental health treatment facility due to self-harm or harm to others, according to Quality Director Michelle Calvert.

Four years later, Calvert said, those numbers still have not decreased.

“The problems that the pandemic has brought to our youth are their social skills, their isolation, higher rates of depression, higher rates of suicidal thoughts,” she said. “All of that is still happening.”

(She stressed that anyone in crisis can get help 24/7 by calling, texting 988 or visiting 988lifeline.org.)

According to data from Kansas and the federal government, young people’s mental health often worsens in the fall when schools resume.

But Calvert says there are resources available, including a youth-led suicide prevention initiative called Zero Reasons Why, which was launched in Johnson County after the number of youth suicide deaths in the community rose dramatically in 2018. There are now four branches across Kansas where teens come together to support one another.

“We’re seeing less stigma,” Calvert said of the organization’s impact in Sedgwick County. “We’re seeing more teens reaching out for help.”

Grant Pritz, a therapist at Mental Health America in south central Kansas, said he recommends some of his patients reduce their time on social media or stop using it altogether. He says it can be addictive and expose young people to harmful content and people, even cyberbullying.

But it’s not all bad. Experts say social media can be a lifeline for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer teens. They might rely on it to cope with unsupportive families or form friendships with other teens with similar identities. Some research shows that finding online communities where they feel safe and understood is linked to less anxiety and a lower risk of suicide among LGBTQ youth.

“Social media was not created to make people feel guilty,” Pritz said. “It was created to connect people.”

“But as a side effect of that connection, all of these things we experience – the struggle with the way our bodies look or the struggle to find our place in the world – are felt so much more keenly on a much larger scale,” he added.

He said it was crucial for teenagers to learn how to use social media responsibly, as they often maintained the habits they developed in adolescence into adulthood.

Calvert said this is where parents come in.

“You don’t just give a child the car keys and send them on their way,” she said. “We teach them everything. First we drive. Then we sit in the passenger seat while they drive.”

“We have to do all of this with social media and phones as well.”

Tips for parents

1. That might mean keeping an eye on their teens’ social media feeds and limiting their time online, but also making sure they can ask for help without getting in trouble – and modeling healthy phone and social media habits for their kids themselves.
2. During early adolescence, according to the American Psychological Association recommends Parents and guardians monitor and train their children on social media use. Older teens may be allowed more autonomy as they develop better digital skills and have a greater need for privacy.
3. The association recommends that parents intervene if teens’ social media habits are interfering with their sleep or exercise needs. And parents should try to have an open dialogue with teens about the types of harmful material they may be exposed to – thus limiting teens’ exposure to content that promotes eating disorders, self-harm and violence against others.
4. Experts also recommend Remind teens of the long-term consequences of their social media use and that their data can be accessed or stored by companies and shared with others even years later.
5. Parents’ use of social media also has a profound impact on their children. And there are some indications that parents could still improve in this area: Almost half of teenagers Respondents to the 2023 Pew survey said their parents were sometimes or often distracted by their phones when trying to talk to them, while less than a third of parents reported the same distractions for themselves.