[HNfriend234]

Social media is a perfect example of where this is used. I know countless people that are literally addicted to it. They want to see every new update continuously and the social media apps are designed to do this through notifications.

I saw this clear as day when I was at jury duty. We were waiting for the court to get back into session. There was a girl sitting next to me on the bench and I noticed about every 5 minutes she would open up her phone and go through her routine. First pull up facebook, scroll through it. Close the app then pull up instragram, scroll through. She did this consistently for the entire 2 hours we were sitting there (the court was delayed). If that isn't addiction, I don't know what is.

Then look at all the mental health problems young people are having these days - bullying, depression, suicide etc. and I would say a big part of that is influenced by social media. People see other people living the "good life" and they get depressed because they can't have the same. Young women see "pretty" women on Instagram and they know they can never compete with that, so their self esteem drops to nothing. Then you have all the bullying that goes on as well. Completely toxic environment.

Social media is the cigarette of our generation.

[mdpopescu]

> If that isn't addiction, I don't know what is.

In my case, boredom. I normally fix that by reading books on my Kindle, but if I don't have it for some reason, the phone is a good substitute.

[munificent]

A few years ago, I realized that one of the reasons I felt tense and anxious and overwhelmed all the time was because I had a huge backlog of mental processing. It was like I had all of this sensory and information input coming in on a conveyor belt and not enough hands on the factory floor to go through, box up the useful stuff, and throw out the rest. So I just felt it all piling up in my head as this vague sense of "too much to do".

It finally clicked for me that the reason was because I was constantly running that conveyor belt. Every second I had some downtime, I got my phone out and read a bit more social media. Not only did I keep stuffing more in, but I never set any time aside to process.

So I decided to break my social media phone habit. Moved Reddit, Facebook, and Twitter off my home screen. Trained myself than when I had a few minutes of boredom to just let myself be bored.

Oh my God, I can't tell you what a difference it made. I finally felt like I could manage my own mental load. Instead of constantly having all of this news that I didn't know what to conclude about, I could just work through my thoughts, sort it out in my head, and put it away.

Being bored is amazing. We should all do a lot more of it.

[4ggr0]

As someone who has ADD, you just described my brain. For me, it's slightly better if I don't spend time on my phone, my brain does still get overloaded quickly though :)

[hashkb]

Kindle app on phone is decent. Better than Instagram.

[alcover]

A girl was sitting next to me on a train. For the whole one hour journey she scrolled and switched between apps in a spasmodic manner. At times she would lay the phone down for a few secs then resume at once.

It looked sick. It looked like someone on amphetamines.

edit: wording

[polynomial]

> Social media is the cigarette of our generation.

Except with cigarettes we could point to the very real physical harms of lung cancer, emphysema, etc.

With social media we just have vaguely sinister warnings about addiction and mental health issues, which can seem paltry in comparison.

The former was obviously a health problem that was deranging people's bodies, whereas the later is seen largely as a social, not a medical, problem.

[hashkb]

It took a really long time for us to realize that. Doctors used to push cigs.

[hashkb]

Thanks for the downvotes. Here's some proof if you think I'm incorrect: https://www.healio.com/news/hematology-oncology/20120325/cig...

Cigarettes were also, and still are, a social problem as well as a health problem. Just like social media.

[wruza]

It’s not exactly the cigarette, it is a smoking right behind a fence where all bitches and bullies do hang out. Just walk further and smoke in nicer places like HN (coughs and spits on js)

[Shared404]

> Then look at all the mental health problems young people are having these days - bullying, depression, suicide etc. and I would say a big part of that is influenced by social media.

Guess who has suffered through most of those, without any kind of social media, outside of HN :)

Edit: And suffered before getting on HN. Seems relevant to the situation.

[bosswipe]

> Then look at all the mental health problems young people are having these days

Is there any evidence that mental health is worse than for previous generations?

[foofoo4u]

Two sources that show anxiety and depression are on the rise with the youth.

https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2019/02/20/most-u-...

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/07/12/a-growing-n...

[4ggr0]

Well, you know, that could also be because the youth racks up student debt, can't afford to buy their own houses, are expected to slave away their life for sub minimal wage jobs etc.

Which is why I don't get why smartphones and social media are almost solely blamed in these kinds of discussion. We have COVID since one year, wealth gaps are getting bigger etc.

[reaperducer]

Is there any evidence that mental health is worse than for previous generations?

I don't think so. But people do seem more fragile these days.

Still, even if it isn't worse, that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to do something about it.

[C19is20]

Couldn't' 'seeming more fragile these days' be a part of copycatting, in that if person X got offended by something, then these addicted-to-social media-types copy the behaviour...and then some?