1/1/2024 0 Comments Facebook issuesThe features that Instagram identifies as most harmful to teens appear to be at the platform’s core. “Social comparison is worse on Instagram,” states Facebook’s deep dive into teen girl body-image issues in 2020, noting that TikTok, a short-video app, is grounded in performance, while users on Snapchat, a rival photo and video-sharing app, are sheltered by jokey filters that “keep the focus on the face.” In contrast, Instagram focuses heavily on the body and lifestyle. 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. They came to the conclusion that some of the problems were specific to Instagram, and not social media more broadly. 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. Many have backgrounds in computer science, psychology and quantitative and qualitative analysis. 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. Source: 2019 Instagram slide presentation called ‘Teen Mental Health Deep Dive’ 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. Its effort includes focus groups, online surveys and diary studies in 20. 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. The documents also show that Facebook has made minimal efforts to address these issues and plays them down in public. They offer an unparalleled picture of how Facebook is acutely aware that the products and systems central to its business success routinely fail. The Instagram documents form part of a trove of internal communications reviewed by the Journal, on areas including teen mental health, political discourse and human trafficking. Mosseri said: “In no way do I mean to diminish these issues.…Some of the issues mentioned in this story aren’t necessarily widespread, but their impact on people may be huge.” Told reporters that research he had seen suggests the app’s effects on teen well-being is likely “quite small.” Said at a congressional hearing in March 2021 when asked about children and mental health. “The research that we’ve seen is that using social apps to connect with other people can have positive mental-health benefits,” CEO In public, Facebook has consistently played down the app’s negative effects on teens, and hasn’t made its research public or available to academics or lawmakers who have asked for it. Another post said: “There is a path to growth if Instagram can continue their trajectory.” “Instagram is well positioned to resonate and win with young people,” said a researcher’s slide posted internally. spend 50% more time on Instagram than they do on Facebook. each day, compared with five million teens logging onto Facebook, where young users have been shrinking for a decade, the materials show. More than 40% of Instagram’s users are 22 years old and younger, and about 22 million teens log onto Instagram in the U.S. Vlasova traced her eating disorder to Instagram.Įxpanding its base of young users is vital to the company’s more than $100 billion in annual revenue, and it doesn’t want to jeopardize their engagement with the platform. “This reaction was unprompted and consistent across all groups.”Īmong 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. “Teens blame Instagram for increases in the rate of anxiety and depression,” said another slide. “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. Repeatedly, the company’s researchers found that Instagram is harmful for a sizable percentage of them, most notably teenage girls. “Comparisons on Instagram can change how young women view and describe themselves.”įor the past three years, Facebook has been conducting studies into how its photo-sharing app affects its millions of young users. “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. Ask your questions now and join them for a live Q&A at 1 p.m. Our reporters will discuss their findings from the WSJ’s Facebook Files investigation.
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