The effect of social media use on children is a fraught area of research as parents and policymakers try to pinpoint the results of a major experiment already underway. Successive studies have added pieces to the puzzle, fleshing out the implications of a near-constant stream of virtual interactions beginning in childhood.
A new study by neuroscientists at the University of North Carolina is trying something new by performing sequential brain scans of high school students between the ages of 12 and 15, a period of particularly rapid brain development.
The researchers found that children who habitually checked their social media feeds around the age of 12 showed a clear trajectory, with their sensitivity to social rewards from peers increasing over time. Teens with less involvement in social media followed the opposite path, with declining interest in social rewards.
The study, published Tuesday in JAMA Pediatrics, is one of the first attempts to capture changes in brain function associated with social media use over a period of years.
The study has important limitations, the authors acknowledge. Because adolescence is a period of growing social relationships, the brain differences may reflect a natural turn toward peers, which could encourage more frequent use of social media.
“We can’t make causal claims that social media changes the brain,” said Eva H. Telzer, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and one of the study’s authors.
But, she added, “teenagers who habitually check their social media are showing these pretty dramatic changes in the way their brains respond, which could potentially have long-term consequences well into adulthood, sort of preparing for brain development over time. of time.”
A team of researchers studied an ethnically diverse group of 169 students in sixth and seventh grade at a high school in rural North Carolina, and divided them into groups based on how often they reported using Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat feeds. to check.
By the age of 12, the pupils already showed clear behavioral patterns. Regular users reported checking their feeds 15 or more times a day; moderate users checked between one and 14 times; non-habitual users checked less than once a day.
The subjects received full brain scans three times, about a year apart, while playing a computer game that delivered rewards and punishments in the form of smiling or frowning peers.
While performing the task, the frequent checkers showed increasing activation of three brain regions: reward-processing circuits, which also respond to experiences such as winning money or taking risks; brain regions that determine salience, pick out what stands out in the environment; and the prefrontal cortex, which helps with regulation and control.
The results showed that “teens who are growing up more likely to check social media become hypersensitive to feedback from their peers,” said Dr. Counter.
The findings don’t capture the magnitude of the brain changes, just their trajectory. And it’s unclear, the authors said, whether the changes are beneficial or harmful. Social sensitivity can be adaptive, showing that the teens learn to connect with others; or it can lead to social anxiety and depression if social needs are not met.
Social media researchers cautioned against drawing far-reaching conclusions based on the findings.
“They show that the way you use it at any point in your life affects the way your brain develops, but we don’t know to what extent or if it’s good or bad,” says Jeff Hancock, the founder of the Stanford Social Media Lab, who was not involved in the research. He said many other variables could have contributed to these changes.
“What if these people joined a new team — a hockey team or a volleyball team — and thus got a lot more social interaction?” he said. It could be, he added, that the researchers “pick up on the development of extraversion and that extroverts are more likely to check their social media.”
He described the paper as “a very sophisticated piece of work”, adding to research that has recently emerged showing that social media sensitivity varies from person to person.
“There are people who have a neurological condition, which means they’re more likely to have regular checkups,” he said. “We are not all the same, and we need to stop thinking that social media is the same for everyone.”
Over the past decade, social media has re-mapped the central experiences of adolescence, a period of rapid brain development.
Nearly all American teens are active through social media: 97 percent go online every day, and 46 percent report being online “almost constantly,” according to the Pew Research Center. Research shows that black and Latino adolescents spend more hours on social media than their white counterparts.
Researchers have documented a range of effects on children’s mental health. Some studies have linked social media use to depression and anxiety, while others have found little association. A 2018 study of lesbian, gay, and bisexual teens found that social media provided them with validation and support, but also exposed them to hate speech.
Experts who reviewed the study said that because the researchers measured students’ social media use only once, around age 12, it was impossible to know how it changed over time, or to predict other factors. factors that may also influence brain development.
Without more information about other aspects of the students’ lives, “it’s challenging to discern how specific differences in brain development are to social media checking,” said Adriana Galvan, a specialist in adolescent brain development at the University of California. in Los Angeles, who was not involved in the investigation.
Jennifer Pfeifer, a professor of psychology at the University of Oregon and co-director of the National Scientific Council on Adolescence, said, “All experiences accumulate and are reflected in the brain.”
“I think you want to put it in context,” she said. “So many other experiences adolescents have will also change the brain. So we don’t want to get into some sort of moral panic about the idea that social media use is changing adolescent brains.”
Dr. Telzer, one of the study’s authors, described the increasing sensitivity to social feedback as “neither good nor bad”.
“It helps them connect with others and get rewards for doing the things that are common in their social world, which involves social interactions online,” she said.
“This is the new normal,” she added. “It is important to understand how this new digital world affects teenagers. It can be associated with changes in the brain, but that can be for the better or for the worse. We don’t necessarily know the long-term consequences yet.”
