Research team's increased use of social media before puberty increases depression symptoms
May 22, 2025
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This is the result of a study by Professor Jason Nagata of the University of California, San Francisco (UC San Francisco), published in JAMA Network Open, an academic journal of the American Medical Association.
The research team followed the relationship between social media usage time and depressive symptoms for three years on 11,876 children aged 9 to 10 who participated in the ABCDS study conducted by 21 research institutes between October 2016 and October 2018. During the study, social media usage time increased from an average of 7 minutes to 73 minutes per day, and their depressive symptoms increased by 35%.
Analysis of the relationship between social media usage time and depressive symptoms showed that depressive symptoms also increased significantly when social media usage time exceeded the average in both the first year of the study and the second and third years of the study. However, it has been shown that depressed children do not use social media more.
Professor Nagata said it is not clear why social media increases depressive symptoms, but previous studies suggest that cyberbullying and sleep disturbance while using social media may have an impact. In another study of the same group of participants, children aged 11 to 12 were 2.62 times more likely to think or try extreme choices a year later when cyberbullying occurred, and 1.92-4.65 times more likely to try marijuana, tobacco, or alcohol.
The research team pointed out that social media is associated with depressive symptoms or dangerous behavior because it is a major means of connecting and communicating with friends, indicating that children are increasingly in a difficult situation.
Social media is being dealt with at the heart of research on the mental health of teenagers.
Earlier, researchers at Oxford University in England found that about 60% of 16- to 18-year-olds spend about 2-4 hours a day on social media, which is increasing the prevalence of depression and anxiety disorders. In the United States, a report was also published that adolescents who used social media for more than three hours a day were twice as likely to experience mental health deterioration, including symptoms of depression and anxiety.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
