Jessai Flores

Social media has become a pervasive influence on the lives of students, leading to mental health challenges and hindering academic performance.

Paul Hoffman, director of Yale Mental Health and Counseling, emphasized that overuse of social media is linked to mental health issues among students.

“Young adults who spend more time on social media and more time on their phones tend to experience more depression and anxiety and tend to not form as strong relationships,” Ada Fenick, a professor of pediatrics at the School of Medicine, told the News.

Social media platforms encourage endless scrolling, impulsive behaviors, and the need for instant gratification. According to a study, an estimated 210 million people worldwide suffer from addiction to social media and the internet.

Marc Potenza, a professor of psychiatry, child study and neuroscience at the School of Medicine, noted that with considerable changes in the digital technology landscape, particularly in the rise of smartphones over the past several decades, there have been significant changes in mental health, especially in adolescents and young adults.

“Currently, about 95 percent of high school-aged teenagers have access to smartphones, and it’s estimated from Pew Research Center data that both in 2022 and 2023 about 46 percent of high school-age teenagers report being online almost constantly, an increase from about half of that amount, about 24 percent, in 2015,” Potenza said.

The data linking social media use to anxiety and depression among adolescents led the U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy, to generate an advisory in 2023 about social media use and youth mental health. Murthy also wrote an opinion in The New York Times that social media sites should contain warning labels similar to those of tobacco and alcohol products to warn of the potential adverse effects of consumption.

As part of a Cooperation in Science and Technology initiative, Potenza and colleagues generated an e-booklet that focuses on how to prevent problematic usage of the internet. Potenza highlighted that it is important to reserve completely tech-free times, replacing digital devices with analog devices as needed, especially in the hour before bedtime.

“People can often feel compelled or engaged with content that can be detrimental to their mental health, especially if they are going through a period of increased anxiety or depression,” Hoffman wrote to the News. “It can be very important that people be mindful about the content they are consuming because often the very goal of the algorithms is to keep you mindlessly engaged.”

Fenick told the News that social media companies have become quite good at creating “quick hits” that make viewers feel for a moment as if their “dopamine receptors are on fire.”

She encourages students to view their phones and social media as learning tools and not as easy access to entertainment for every minute of the day.

“Get off social media if you can, but if you feel like you want to use it, then I would set yourself a limit for how much time you spend on social media,” Fenick said. “I would set a limit not just on how much time, but on which apps you use. Be very thoughtful about what you’re using it for and what your purpose is, and try to make sure that you spend at least that amount of time or more on interactions with other humans in real life.”

Francesco Casetti, Sterling Professor of Humanities and film and media studies, and Neta Alexander, an assistant professor of film and media teaching algorithmic literacy, noted the addictive nature of social media. This spring, the two professors will be co-teaching a new seminar called “Media Anxieties.”

Alexander explained that algorithmic recommendation systems are strategically designed to exploit cognitive vulnerabilities to maximize screen time. 

“These platforms are designed to be addictive by using intermittent rewards and trying to invoke negative emotional responses such as rage, anxiety and jealousy, which are known to prolong our engagement and deepen our attachment to our devices,” Alexander said.

Alexander recommended that to limit the harmful effects of excessive social media use, students could download screen time apps that set strict limits or “lock” themselves out of their favorite platform and prioritize in-person activities. She also recommended students turn off notifications from social media apps or switch their smartphone display to grayscale — which is less distracting and eye-catching. She noted that implementing these simple strategies is especially important at nighttime when tech companies are competing with sleep and users’ biological needs.

Alexander told the News that it is important not to generalize the effects and potential harms of social media platforms, as they depend on the user’s age, support system, lived experience and other factors.

“Social media platforms like Instagram and X have been shown to be correlated with self-harm, anxiety, depression and social isolation,” Alexander wrote. “Such concerns are backed by empirical studies, including data collected, concealed and ignored by the tech companies themselves and revealed by whistleblowers.” 

She explained that several concerning trends, such as an epidemic of body dysmorphia, self-hatred and attention deficits, have arisen among teenagers leading tech-dependent lives.

Alexander noted that the ubiquitous use of “beauty filters” and AI-generated images and videos gives rise to impossible beauty standards and pushes young users toward dangerous and unnecessary plastic surgeries.

“Social media platforms quantify relationship, intimacy, and attention by creating a 24/7 culture of swiping, liking, and commenting,” Alexander wrote. “This might lead to enhanced anxiety and low self-esteem. [There’s also this] constant need to keep up with the most up-to-date, increasingly expensive personal electronic and data packages, which put financial pressure on teenagers.”

Casetti told the News he had taught a class last semester called “Scared to Death: Fear, Threats and Media,” and that one of the prerequisites for registering for the class was to accept the idea of fasting from social media for 24 hours and writing a diary.

He noted that he received many surprising entries and that one-tenth of the class was unable to suspend their connection with the media for 24 hours.

“One student wrote that he touched the Instagram icon by accident because it was an involuntary gesture,” Casetti said. “And once he was reconnected with his Instagram, he broke the promise to be away from the social network for 24 hours.”

He noted that other students admitted their surrender for other reasons, with one writing “I was scared to be alone with my thoughts” in their entry.

Casetti recalled that the unusual prerequisite allowed students to realize just how attached they were to social media and the harmful extent of their addiction.

“It’s beautiful to meet people, to mix [and mingle]. This is one of the great results of the diaries that my students wrote last year,” Casetti said. “A number of them, during the 24 hours in which they avoided being connected [online], they wrote that they rediscovered the pleasure of reading a book, a physical book. That was fantastic … So I would say to be aware, to use a certain kind of moderation and to be able to discover the entire latitude of the pleasure and the affordances of life.”

Mental Health and Counseling has therapists available to work with students who feel that social media use is negatively impacting their mental health.