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‘Facebook depression’ claim is research-challenged

March 30, 2011 By Anne 5 Comments

The good news is, there’s a lot of good advice for pediatricians and parents in “Clinical Report: The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families,” just published in the journal Pediatrics. The bad news is, the “Facebook depression” part is not grounded in the very research the report cites – and of course that’s the part (on p. 802 of the PDF version of the report) that all the media coverage picked up on and got wrong because, at best, it’s overstated in the report. In an audio interview for ConnectSafely co-director Larry Magid in CNET, the report’s lead author, Dr. Gwenn O’Keefe, seemed to back off from the report’s statement that “depression develops when preteens and teens spend a great deal of time on social media sites, such as Facebook, and then begin to exhibit classic symptoms of depression [emphasis mine].” Dr. O’Keefe told Larry: “These are kids who are already really struggling emotionally and psychologically and Facebook is perhaps making it worse, or certainly not helping the situation. A kid who’s just a normal teenager having the ups and downs of teenage life – they’re not going to suddenly have a clinical depression because of spending time on Facebook. There doesn’t seem to be any evidence of that whatsoever.”

And the peer-reviewed study cited in the report’s section “doesn’t have anything to do with ‘Facebook depression’,” said its author, Joanne Davila of State University of New York, Stony Brook. “The work that I have done that has been cited as evidence for ‘Facebook depression’ has been completely mis-cited by the media and other people who have talked about it, which is very, very unfortunate.” What Dr. Davila found in a study that hasn’t been published yet, she told Larry, was that, “just the use of social networking – how frequently people engage in using Facebook for example – is not associated with depressive systems… Really, social networking is just another salient venue where problematic relationships can play out and can have an impact on depression.” I so hope parents and pediatricians will hear the “just another venue” part of what Dr. Davila said. For Pete’s sake, don’t fear Facebook. It’s not the problem. It’s just another place where problems can flare up – where human interaction, positive and negative, occurs.

So Time’s focus in its coverage is right on point. When pediatricians are asking their patients about how things are going in their lives, they should be asking about how they’re going on cellphones, on Xbox Live, and on Facebook too, because what’s going on in those “places” is part of their everyday socializing – just part of their lives. Doctors who ask about the Facebook part, too, are to be commended.

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Filed Under: Research Tagged With: AAP, Facebook depression, Parenting, Pediatrics, social media research, youth risk research

Reader Interactions

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  1. With this teen texting study, only methodology was news | NetFamilyNews.org says:
    September 13, 2013 at 4:00 pm

    […] “Facebook depression claim is research-challenged” […]

    Reply
  2. Pediatrics group misdiagnoses ‘Facebook Depression’ | Find to Us says:
    May 31, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    […] Collier, my co-director at ConnectSafely.org also weighed in. While labeling the AAP report as “research-challenged,” she did agree that “when […]

    Reply
  3. Pediatrics group misdiagnoses ‘Facebook Depression’ | Safety Village says:
    April 17, 2011 at 7:48 am

    […] between correlation and causation.”Anne Collier, my co-director at ConnectSafely.org also weighed in. Whilelabeling the AAP report as “research-challenged,” she did agree that “whenpediatricians […]

    Reply
  4. Reason Morning Links: Rifts, Riots, Ryan | Daily Libertarian says:
    April 4, 2011 at 2:12 pm

    […] Debunking “Facebook depression.” […]

    Reply
  5. Reason Morning Links: Rifts, Riots, Ryan - Hit & Run : Reason Magazine says:
    April 4, 2011 at 12:07 pm

    […] Debunking "Facebook depression." […]

    Reply

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Our (DIGITAL) PARENTING BASICS: Safety + Social
NAMLE, the National Association for Media Literacy Education
CASEL.org & the 5 core social-emotional competencies of SEL
Center for Democracy & Technology
Center for Innovative Public Health Research
Childnet International
Committee for Children
Congressional Internet Caucus Academy
ConnectSafely.org
Control Shift: a pivotal book for Internet safety
Crimes Against Children Research Center
Crisis Textline
Cyber Civil Rights Initiative's Revenge Porn Crisis Line
Cyberwise.org
danah boyd's blog and book about networked youth
Disconnected, Carrie James's book on digital ethics
FOSI.org's Good Digital Parenting
The research of Global Kids Online
The Good Project at Harvard's School of Education
If you watch nothing else: "Parenting in a Digital Age" TED Talk by Prof. Sonia Livingstone
The International Bullying Prevention Association
Let Grow Foundation
Making Caring Common
Raising Digital Natives, author Devorah Heitner's site
Renee Hobbs at the Media Education Lab
MediaSmarts.ca
The New Media Literacies
Report of the Aspen Task Force on Learning & the Internet and our guide to Creating Trusted Learning Environments
The Ruler Approach to social-emotional learning (Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence)
Sources of Strength
"Young & Online: Perspectives on life in a digital age" from young people in 26 countries (via UNICEF)
"Youth Safety on a Living Internet": 2010 report of the Online Safety & Technology Working Group (and my post about it)

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