Social media harm: What does the evidence actually show? | Stuff.co.nz

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]Most parents worry that social media could [music] be bad for their kids, but what does the evidence actually show?

[00:00:05]The first answer is that it's complicated. Whether social media affects your child's mental [music] health depends on a range of things like their strengths and weaknesses or their background. We can't say definitively at this point [music] that social media causes poor mental health, but we can say with increasing confidence [music] that there's a correlation here. This is especially true for heavier users of social media. Those who spend more than [music] 3 hours a day on these platforms have double the risk of developing poor mental health like [music] anxiety or depression. In the teen years, the emotional and social part of your brain develops fast, but the part that controls impulses and emotions lags [music] way behind and social media exploits this. It hooks your brain with constant rewards like likes, scrolling, [music] and notifications when you don't yet have the mental breaks to stop yourself. And companies know about this.

[00:00:49]There's also a mountain of evidence linking social media to >> [music] >> cyberbullying, predators, and body image issues. None of these findings are definitive, but doctors and scientists have [music] more recently been saying, "We've seen enough and that it's time to regulate." So, this precautionary approach is what's driving calls to ban social media for under 16-year-olds including here in New Zealand.