Who needs research? You see what's happening out there, what the kids are saying. It fits so well with what you already intuited.
But there was some "internal research" at Facebook, revealed in the documents the whistle-blower, Frances Haugen, disclosed, supposedly showing that "Instagram made body-image issues worse for one in three teenage girls." But: "Facebook has responded that the research did not show a causal link and that a majority of teenage girls experiencing body-image issues reported that Instagram either made their body image better or had no impact."
This NYT article should tell us the nature of the "research" we're talking about, not refer to it with no basis for assessing it and switching us to quotes from someone who might be an expert — we're not told her credentials — who says we don't need research.
I followed links and got to the Wall Street Journal article, "Facebook Knows Instagram Is Toxic for Teen Girls, Company Documents Show/Its own in-depth research shows a significant teen mental-health issue that Facebook plays down in public," but you'll need a subscription to read that. Let's see what it says about the research:
"Thirty-two percent of teen girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse," the researchers said in a March 2020 slide presentation posted to Facebook's internal message board, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. "Comparisons on Instagram can change how young women view and describe themselves."
For the past three years, Facebook has been conducting studies into how its photo-sharing app affects its millions of young users. Repeatedly, the company's researchers found that Instagram is harmful for a sizable percentage of them, most notably teenage girls.
"We make body image issues worse for one in three teen girls," said one slide from 2019, summarizing research about teen girls who experience the issues.
What was the methodology of the study?
"Teens blame Instagram for increases in the rate of anxiety and depression," said another slide. "This reaction was unprompted and consistent across all groups." Among teens who reported suicidal thoughts, 13% of British users and 6% of American users traced the desire to kill themselves to Instagram, one presentation showed....
It doesn't say what percentage of the teens reported suicidal thoughts, only what percentage of them cited Instagram. And I'd like to see a list of the other things they cited and what the percentage was. I'll just guess that in-person conflicts with other people had a higher percentage. And were these teens — the 13% and the 6% — suicidal because of Instagram-focus body image problems?
The company's research on Instagram, the deepest look yet at what the tech giant knows about its impact on teens and their mental well-being, represents one of the clearest gaps revealed in the documents between Facebook's understanding of itself and its public position.
Its effort includes focus groups, online surveys and diary studies in 2019 and 2020. It also includes large-scale surveys of tens of thousands of people in 2021 that paired user responses with Facebook's own data about how much time users spent on Instagram and what they saw there.
So that's some information about the methodology.
The researchers are Facebook employees in areas including data science, marketing and product development who work on a range of issues related to how users interact with the platform. Many have backgrounds in computer science, psychology and quantitative and qualitative analysis. In five presentations over 18 months to this spring, the researchers conducted what they called a "teen mental health deep dive" and follow-up studies.
They came to the conclusion that some of the problems were specific to Instagram, and not social media more broadly. That is especially true concerning so-called social comparison, which is when people assess their own value in relation to the attractiveness, wealth and success of others....
In focus groups, Instagram employees heard directly from teens who were struggling. "I felt like I had to fight to be considered pretty or even visible," one teen said of her experience on Instagram. After looking through photos on Instagram, "I feel like I am too big and not pretty enough," another teen told Facebook's researchers. "It makes me feel insecure about my body even though I know I am skinny."
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32 comments:
Isn't everything toxic for teen girls?
Seems like 20 years ago girls would have said the same about magazine photos. But the issue for me is what Instagram has learned versus what it has disclosed.
This was the tobacco industry's "research" playbook for several decades. It was insulting to anyone with half a brain, as one could see the direct damage to lung tissue.
We must treat Facebook as a tobacco company. Age limits. Warning labels. Taxation. Ban advertising.
Just stop at Instagram is toxic.
The real problem here is how kids are raised.
Natural selection and attractiveness to the opposite sex for purposes of procreation is one of the primary biological drives that make us human.
The only other drive that rises to the same level is self preservation and that biological drive is obviously less consistent.
Kids need to be taught about how this works, why they have these thoughts.
But the post-modernists are intent on creating a generation of sociopathic basket cases that don't know what pronoun to use or why they want boys/girls to like them.
I'm not an expert but the minds of teenaged girls are filled with mush, just going by four of them talking at an adjacent table. One of them alone would be pretty lost mentally.
My intuition tells me that the “body image” issue from the pictures is only part of the problem. Another major part would be the constant peer feedback (or lack thereof) that Instagram floods its users with every moment of the day.
How come nobody liked my post? Why did my pic only get 3 comments when Sally’s got 300? Why didn’t this one specific person comment on my post yet? Why hasn’t anyone commented in the last 20 minutes? I thought I was friends with this group of 5 girls, but they all commented right away on each other but haven’t commented on me yet. I tagged this person in my pic, but she didn’t tag me in hers.
It’s a real-time popularity ranking system, and the teens can’t escape it for longer than 5 minutes before they get a new alert and it starts all over again.
Instagram = digital meth
Reade ring @ 12:41: “… But the issue for me is what Instagram has learned versus what it has disclosed.”
This. And I expect we will learn (1) Instagram both stonewalls and leaks because its workforce includes lots of SJWs who will want to “fix” things and punish corporate malefactors; (2) Instagram’s vaunted data analytics include a ridiculous amount of question-begging and SWAG and (3) the ultimate irony may be that this empowering technology ends by imploding under a crushing load of litigation and regulation.
Readering said...
Seems like 20 years ago girls would have said the same about magazine photos. But the issue for me is what Instagram has learned versus what it has disclosed.
Two salient points.
Instagram is not much different from Teen Vogue circa 2000.
But our understanding of brain development and the affects of things like acetylcholine, epinephrine and dopamine reward pathways has advanced greatly.
The number of distractions in daily life that overwhelm our reticular activation system is accelerated by handheld devices that have constant visual and auditory stimulus.
Facebook and Instagram have people who have looked at this as much as I have and probably more. Just minus the morals.
Blogger Joe said..."My intuition tells me that the “body image” issue from the pictures is only part of the problem. Another major part would be the constant peer feedback (or lack thereof) that Instagram floods its users with every moment of the day."
Yeah, the whole concept seems like an awful idea.
Keeping up with the Joneses now means your kids keeping up with their kids.
Maybe those cultures who require coverage of women's bodies are on to something. Hard to compare to what you can't see. Maybe hijab is better for female mental health.
Let's face it, social media weaponizes all of the social dysfunctions inherent in human communities. And until people decide to not participate we're going to continue to be their live lab bats.
This aspect of the current Facebook issue is a distraction fronting for the larger plan to manipulate the government into forcing Facebook into policing political content in a manner that is favorable to the mainstream media/Democratic Party narrative- quite possibly with Facebook's covert backing.
The "whistleblower" is supported by high level Democrat political consultants and the "suicide" and "teenage harm" claims are intended to garner support from people who are triggered by that sort of emotional appeal.
It's bait, Althouse, and they're throwing it your way.
I was struck by Haugen’s comment that the Instagram feed invades the home of the teen as well…. There is no escape or safe place…. Last thing before sleep, first thing in the am. Same would be true of texting too, I suppose, but without the rating and ranking. The constant feeling of rejection is brutal on anyone, let alone a teenager. Maybe the likes and shares need to go…. Comments too?
Tik Tok too (from tim-buk-tu).
i only known one thing. women who cry over their body image, make great leaders.
"Comparison is the thief of joy" - Theodore Roosevelt
Little did he know. Wasn't that Zuckerberg's first website? A site that let the male students vote on the hotness of the co-eds at Harvard?
Who needs research? You see what's happening out there, what the kids are saying. It fits so well with what you already intuited.
You're also describing climate change.
I don't see how Instagram is any worse than a regular day in high school. Have you ever known a teen girl who was happy with her body or her appearance? They are always comparing themselves to other people, no matter how beautiful they really are. No wonder thay all want to be boys now.
I had some issues posting.
This is a repeat of sorts so expunge if the original got through.
Sounds like the social media companies are as good for health as the tobacco companies, and perhaps they should be treated just the same. Such as made to beg for forgiveness and plundered heavily.
This probably has an evolutionary explanation to it. If she doesn't match up, it's normal and good to feel shame. Embrace shame. And anxiety. Learn to love those feelings. Only then you can be happy.
Anyone heard of Finsta? As in: Fake Instagram.
I’m assuming it’s a fake name- no idea. I only post on this blog- I only read these comments.
No Fcbk- no tiktok- just blogs. W/3girls- I only truly worry about one- 18 and w/a big girl job, so hopefully not much screen time.
My son- no worries there!
Odd how male body builders or pro athletes bodies aren't toxic to young men. I thought young women were more mature mentally than their male peers, according to Feminist Orthodoxy?
Maybe we need to change the culture of young girls to toughen them up so they don't get mentally ill over pictures of people they don't know.
Odd how male body builders or pro athletes bodies aren't toxic to young men.
Odd how the only problem identified in these articles is body image-based suicides of teenage women. According to data from the CDC, there are four times as many suicides among men aged 15-24 than among women (the ratio per capita would be higher, as there are more women than men in this country). In fact, suicides among men are never less than 1.5 times the number among women at any age range. But screw men, lets focus on the women.
Also, an August 2020 survey by the CDC showed that 25.5% of people aged between 18 and 24 and 16% of people aged 25-44 had seriously contemplated suicide within the past 30 days. If Facebook/Instagram bears responsibility for promoting suicidal thoughts, shouldn't Fauci/CDC/crazy Dem govs pushing lockdowns be equally liable?
Readering said...
Seems like 20 years ago girls would have said the same about magazine photos. But the issue for me is what Instagram has learned versus what it has disclosed.
20 years ago, a teenaged girl might look at a photo in a magazine and make unfavorable comparisons to herself. On Instagram, they post their own images and people make comments, often unkind. Or, they get ignored which may be just as bad or worse than the bad comments. Kids can be vicious to one another. In the past, it was primarily limited to kids in their classes or schools, but with global social media, the comments can come from everywhere. As the grandfather of a 17 year old girl who is dealing with a lot of issues, this worries me.
Haugen is getting heavy play not for IG teen girl stuff - that's the front and its own sad problem - but to advocate for FB expelling even more content of the type that's on this blog every day. She's a Trojan Horse for more one-side-only BS in the media, if that's even possible.
"In fact, suicides among men are never less than 1.5 times the number among women at any age range."
Women and minorities hardest hit.
The world would be a better place if Facebook never existed. There, I said it. I never liked it, and have never used it and my life has not suffered one bit for it. Although I did like the freshman book that the idea came from when I was in college. Great way to get to know incoming students (and girls).
“My intuition tells me that the “body image” issue from the pictures is only part of the problem. Another major part would be the constant peer feedback (or lack thereof) that Instagram floods its users with every moment of the day”
Part of the body image issue is that many more girls today are seriously overweight. Overweight is now becoming normal - I see more and more body positive (fat normalizing) ads on TV these days. There really weren’t any fat girls in my HS, a bit over 50 years ago. Only one at my kid’s prep school 15 years, but now you see fat girls everywhere. On the flip side, the boys seem to tend towards the bean pole look, though there are plenty of pre-obese too. The problem is that we are still wired to prefer thinner females, because they are healthier, on average. We are pretty sure that the reason that our two oldest grandsons are dating overweight girls is the same reason that their grandmother gives them her condom lecture every time she sees them - they are the ones putting out. And indeed, that seems pretty common, that the girls putting out in HS are very often the fat ones, because they are convinced that sex is their only way to get a halfway decent guy. Instead of exercising and watching what they eat, when rejected by a guy, the just get depressed and eat.
The problem is that being fat in MS and HS very often evolves into being obese later in life. Type II Diabetes used to be mostly limited to later in life. Now we are seeing it in adolescents. I remember seeing a photo a month or two ago of a mother and her young son, in a hospital. She was crying, while her son was having a hard time breathing. He had COVID-19, and was fat. And it turns out that almost every kid who has died from that virus had serious comorbidities - the most common being obesity. Moreover, obesity makes carrying a baby to term much more problematic. So, maybe more worrying about body image and fat shaming, and less body positive fat justifying is in order for these girls.
Of course, middle school girls have always had image problems. My partner tells of her daughter and her BFF. Her daughter had long legs and a perfect bubble butt (which she tries to tell me is attractive in both sexes - I disagree, not having one), but no tits. Her BFF had large tits, but short legs and a big ass. Both desperately wanted what the other had. But then by part way through high school, they were over it, and were happy with what they were blessed with.
I think I understand the basic complaint. Whatever you overheard Ashley telling Madison in the girls' room is small scale compared to what gets posted on Facebook or Instagram for the whole school and community to read. But I think Haugen, whose main concern is with politics and "civic integrity," is using the teen bullying issue to give her movement more traction. I can't say that it's conscious misdirection, but it certainly is a convenient distraction from seriously considering what government involvement could lead to.
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