New Study In The Journal Of Pediatrics Says Maybe It’s Not Social Media, But Helicopter Parenting That’s Making Kids Depressed

We’ve been covering, at great length, the moral panic around the claims that social media is what’s making kids depressed. The problem with this narrative is that there’s basically no real evidence to support it. As the American Psychological Association found when it reviewed all the literature, despite many, many dozens of studies done on the impact of social media on kids, no one was able to establish a causal relationship.

As that report noted, the research seemed to show no inherent benefit or harm for most kids. For some, it showed a real benefit (often around kids being able to find like-minded people online to communicate with). For a very small percentage, it appeared to potentially exacerbate existing issues. And those are really the cases that we should be focused on.

But, instead, the narrative that continues to make the rounds is that social media is inherently bad for kids. That leads to various bills around age verification and age gating to keep kids off of social media.

Supporters of these bills will point to charts like this one, regarding teen suicide rates, noting the uptick correlates with the rise of social media.

Of course, they seem to cherry pick the start date of that chart, because if you go back further, you realize that while the uptick is a concern, it’s still way below what it had been in the 1990s (pre-social media).

In case that embed isn’t working, here’s an image of it:

Obviously, the increase in suicides is a concern. But, considering that every single study that tries to link it to social media ends up failing to do so, that suggests that there might be some other factor at play here.

A recent study in the Journal of Pediatrics suggests a compelling alternative. It’s not social media, but the rise of helicopter parenting, in which kids no longer have spaces to just hang out with each other and be kids. It’s titled: Decline in Independent Activity as a Cause of Decline in Children’s Mental Well-being: Summary of the Evidence. If you can’t see the full version, there’s a preprint version here.

The research summarizes the decline in “independent mobility” for kids over the last few decades:

Considerable research, mostly in Europe, has focused on children’s independent mobility (CIM), defined as children’s freedom to travel in their neighborhood or city without adult accompaniment. That research has revealed significant declines in CIM, especially between 1970 and 1990, but also some large national differences. For example, surveys regarding the “licenses” (permissions) parents grant to their elementary school children revealed that in England, license to walk home alone from school dropped from 86% in 1971 to 35% in 1990 and 25% in 2010; and license to use public buses alone dropped from 48% in 1971 to 15% in 1990 to 12% in 2010.11 In another study, comparing CIM in 16 different countries (US not included), conducted from 2010 to 2012, Finland stood out as allowing children the greatest freedom of movement. The authors wrote: “At age 7, a majority of Finnish children can already travel to places within walking distance or cycle to places alone; by age 8 a majority can cross main roads, travel home from school and go out after dark alone, by age 9 a majority can cycle on main roads alone, and by age 10 a majority can travel on local buses alone.” Although we have found no similar studies of parental permissions for US children, other data indicate that the US is more like the UK concerning children’s independent mobility than like Finland. For example, National Personal Transportation Surveys revealed that only 12.7% walked or biked to school in 2009 compared with 47.7% in 1969.

And then it notes the general decline in mental health as well, which they highlight started long before social media existed:

Perhaps the most compelling and disturbing evidence comes from studies of suicide and suicidal thoughts. Data compiled by the CDC indicate that the rate of suicide among children under age 15 rose 3.5-fold between 1950 and 2005 and by another 2.4-fold between 2005 and 2020. No other age group showed increases nearly this large. By 2019, suicide was the second leading cause of death for children from age 10 through 15, behind only unintentional injury. Moreover, the 2019 YRBS survey revealed that during the previous year 18.8% of US high school students seriously considered attempting suicide, 15.7% made a suicide plan, 8.9% attempted suicide one or more times, and 2.5% made a suicide attempt requiring medical treatment. We are clearly experiencing an epidemic of psychopathology among young people.

But, unlike those who assume correlation is causation with regards to social media, the researchers here admit there needs to be more. And they bring the goods, pointing to multiple studies that suggest a pretty clear causal relationship, rather than just correlation.

Several studies have examined relationships between the amount of time young children have for self-directed activities at home and psychological characteristics predictive of future wellbeing. These have revealed significant positive correlations between amount of self-structured time (largely involving free play) and (a) scores on two different measures of executive functioning; (b) indices of emotional control and social ability; and (c) scores, two years later, on a measure of self-regulation. There is also evidence that risky play, where children deliberately put themselves in moderately frightening situations (such as climbing high into a tree) helps protect against the development of phobias and reduces future anxiety by increasing the person’s confidence that they can deal effectively with emergencies.

Studies with adults involving retrospections about their childhood experiences provide another avenue of support for the idea that early independent activity promotes later wellbeing. In one such study, those who reported much free and adventurous play in their elementary school years were assessed as having more social success, higher self-esteem, and better overall psychological and physical health in adulthood than those who reported less such play. In another very similar study, amount of reported free play in childhood correlated positively with measures of social success and goal flexibility (ability to adapt successfully to changes in life conditions) in adulthood. Also relevant here are studies in which adults (usually college students) rated the degree to which their parents were overprotective and overcontrolling (a style that would reduce opportunity for independent activity) and were also assessed for their current levels of anxiety and depression. A systematic review of such studies revealed, overall, positive correlations between the controlling, overprotective parenting style and the measures of anxiety and depression.

They also note that they are not claiming (of course) that this is the sole reason for the declines in mental health. Just that there is strong evidence that it is a key component. They explore a few other options that may contribute, including increased pressure at schools and societal changes. They also consider the impact of social media and digital technologies and note (as we have many times) that there just is no real evidence to support the claims:

Much recent discussion of young people’s mental health has focused on the role of increased use of digital technologies, especially involvement with social media. However, systematic reviews of research into this have provided little support for the contention that either total screen time or time involved with social media is a major cause of, or even correlate of, declining mental health. One systematic review concluded that research on links between digital technology use and teens’ mental health “has generated a mix of often conflicting small positive, negative and null associations” (Odgers & Jensen, 2020). Another, a “review of reviews” concluded that “the association between digital technology use, or social media use in particular, and psychological well-being is, on average, negative but very small” and noted some evidence, from longitudinal research, that negative correlations may result from declining mental health leading to more social media use rather than the reverse (Orben, 2020)

Indeed, if this theory is true, that the lack of spaces for kids to explore and play and experiment without adult supervision is a leading cause of mental health decline, you could easily see how those who are depressed are more likely to seek out those private spaces, and turn to social media, given the lack of any such spaces they can go to physically.

And, if that’s the case, then all of these efforts to ban social media for kids, or to make social media more like Disneyland, could likely end up doing a lot more harm than good by cutting off one of the last remaining places where kids can communicate with their peers without adults watching over their every move. Indeed, the various proposals to give parents more access to what their kids are doing online could worsen the problem as well, taking away yet another independent space for kids.

Over the last few years, there’s been a push to bring back more “dangerous” play for kids, as people have begun to realize that things may have gone too far in the other direction. Perhaps it’s time we realize that social media fits into that category as well.