[alex_young]

The "it's inconclusive" line is being pushed by FB pretty hard right now, and it feels pretty similar to the smoking industry telling people there's no proof cigarettes cause cancer 20 years ago.

Obviously something is causing marked increases in teen depression and suicide attempts over the same period as the move to 24/7 social media. Sure, it's possible there are other factors, but isn't it obvious that social media is at least playing a significant role?

https://www.npr.org/2021/05/18/990234501/facebook-calls-link...

[knaik94]

I don't know how fair it is to say facebook is playing a major role when most of the content consumed on facebook is no longer what your immediate friends post from their personal lives. At one point in time, I would agree that the culture of comparing yourself to others' success lead to dark thoughts. But now there's so much on facebook, it's hard to pin down a specific cause. Is it the fake news, the fear of missing out, the articles about global warming, the economic depression, or seeing posts about covid deaths?

I would argue facebook is not even the main demographic of teenagers anymore. Facebook is full of millenial+. Younger generations are on tiktok and youtube.

Facebook is not social media, instagram and whatsapp and facebook together could arguably be a larger influence but those three still don't make up a majority of social media.

Facebook and social media and the internet itself can be used to escape real life problems. Certain psychologist have already generalized an addiction to encompass all of internet and computer use. The reality is that internet and computer and social media are all tools. The actual issue is some people's unhealthy mechanisms for coping with difficult struggles in life.

This generation happened to live in the time great technological advancements. It's not obvious when you dig deeper into the relationship.

[thaumasiotes]

> Obviously something is causing marked increases in teen depression and suicide attempts over the same period as the move to 24/7 social media.

When in-person school was suspended over covid, the teen suicide rate dropped dramatically.

[germinalphrase]

My quick searching seems to indicate that rates were flat or somewhat decreased, but not dramatically.

As a high school teacher, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that though. My students who struggle the hardest often find school to be a significant, additional source of stress. The thinking can also become circular: I’m struggling, and don’t have the capacity to perform (even if I want to do well and have in the past), and that means I’m incapable of performing well, and so I’m struggling more, and so I lack the capacity to…

[thaumasiotes]

Rates were flat in a sense of temporal continuity - they stayed around a level that is normal some of the time.

They were very far down in a sense of seasonality. Teen suicide rates are -- normally -- much higher during the school year than they are during the summer.

https://nitter.net/tylerblack32/status/1470785708394754052#m

> The first school year of the pandemic (with full lockdowns) also represents the FIRST TIME IN 21 YEARS that March-June (school months) had the same low suicide rate as July (non school month). Typically, school months associated with 36-55% increase [in suicide] in HS kids.

So about a 30% decrease in suicide rate from shutting down school. I would argue that a 30% decrease qualifies as "dramatic".

[purpleblue]

You mean suicide rates skyrocketed during the Pandemic.

[watwut]

They did not. That is something that simply did not happened.

[pessimizer]

But school has other important benefits.

[thaumasiotes]

That's not obvious. If children's opinions counted, it might well be a minority position.

And if we're willing to assume that school has important benefits, the same is obviously true of Facebook.

[thrown_22]

Just because something is doesn't mean it's facebook. Especially since basically no teens use facebook.

Your other example also dates you pretty hard. The surgeon general report of 1964 said conclusively that cigarettes cause lung cancer and other diseases. 1964 is somewhat longer ago than 20 years.

In short: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrfhsxxmdE

[2muchcoffeeman]

Can’t you just replace Facebook with “social media”? There’s very few good uses of social media and the entire thing is free, so there’s no way they are making money doing things in your interest.

[thrown_22]

Sure, we can then talk about the impact of hn on mental health.

[2muchcoffeeman]

Sure. I know I’ve sometimes I’ve gotten unfocused at work and just reload HN every 10minutes. HN is probably net negative on mental health for many.

But I think you’re trying to “gotcha” me.

But HN doesn’t send me notifications, or have ads, or collect data about me, or sell my data, or have curated pictures that forces me to compare my life to others and make me feel bad.

So on a priority list, HN is waaaaaaaaaaay at the bottom.

[dhosek]

But the tobacco companies insisted to the contrary and funded their own “studies” to the contrary well after 1964.

[thrown_22]

They did not. The studies which cast doubt on smoking cancer link were all done in the 1950s: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3490543/

The next 30 years to the 1990s were a fight to muddy the science over second hand smoke which was a different issue.

[switchbak]

> In a 1971 television interview, the president of Philip Morris denied the health risks that pregnant women and their babies face, saying that “It’s true that babies born from women who smoke are smaller, but they are just as healthy as the babies born to women who do not smoke. Some women would prefer to have smaller babies.” [1]

The tobacco industry is well known to have distorted the truth for many years after the 50's, and the above quote is just one of many that are very easy to find. Yours seems a tough position to defend.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Cullman

[pdimitar]

Your nitpicking doesn't further the discussion.

It's a fact that they did their best to mislead the public for the longest possible time. Does it truly matter how exactly? You can have more than one gun to shoot with, you know.

[fshbbdssbbgdd]

I’d be interested in hearing a comparison of how researching go about establishing causality for a smoking-cancer link vs. a Facebook-depression link. Obviously, it’s hard to do a proper randomized controlled trial in both cases. Anyone know more about what kinds of methods can be used? I think it would be useful to help this conversation be a little more fact-based and less ideological.

[germinalphrase]

I mean, if the answer does echo the above position that the problem is unhealthy time allotment (fb/insta/whatever is too good at causing teens to spend time on their platform rather doing other things that are healthy for them) that’s pretty terrible news for a company that will do almost anything but reduce engagement time.