Social Media Mechanisms Affecting Adolescent Mental Health (SoMe3)

影响青少年心理健康的社交媒体机制 (SoMe3)

• 批准号: MR/X034925/1
• 负责人: Amy Orben
• 金额: $ 202.21万
• 依托单位: University of Cambridge
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Fellowship
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2024 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=MR%2FX034925%2F1
• 关键词: Social; Media; Mechanisms; Affecting; Adolescent

Adolescents estimate that they spend just under 5 hours online every day. This is almost as much time as they spend at school, with the average UK school day lasting 6.5 hours. Adolescent mental health has also declined substantially over the last decade, putting large-scale pressures on UK health services, society and the economy. This has made many concerned that digitalisation is actively damaging adolescent mental health. However, we still know relatively little about whether such concerns are warranted. This is a scientific supply issue highlighted by both the President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists ("We desperately need more research into the benefits and harms of technology use") and the UK Chief Medical Officers ("...more comprehensive research should be supported by health bodies and research institutions. An appropriate mechanism for measuring children's digital engagement needs to be developed...").A lot of research on digitalisation and adolescent mental health has focused on social media, a particularly high-risk digital innovation. Social media is used heavily by the adolescent population (94% of 16-17s have a social media profile) and introduces changes to the social environment that could amplify pre-existing vulnerabilities. For example, peer rejection is especially salient in adolescence, and a mental health risk factor. Social media quantifies the social feedback adolescents receive from peers through 'like' counts, which could increase the salience of social feedback such as rejection, and therefore increase mental health risk (Mechanism A). Further social media allows for continued access to peers, which is very attractive to adolescents. This can lead to habitual social media use and self-control failures that impact mental health directly and indirectly (Mechanism B). Results of research examining the link between social media use and mental ill health have however been largely inconsistent, and consensus has not moved far beyond statements that the link is complicated. This has made it very challenging to design evidence-based recommendations and interventions to address the impacts of social media across society, policy and industry (e.g., the Online Safety Bill). My fellowship will address this issue by delivering a ground-breaking portfolio of basic and applied research. My team will take a novel mechanistic approach, investigating the mechanisms underlying the impact of social media on adolescent mental health (e.g., Mechanisms A and B, among others). We will first study these mechanisms of interest using observational data across three distinct levels of scientific explanation (experiential, algorithmic, and biological/cognitive). We will then systematically manipulate them in a longitudinal study, to test their mental health impact on an individual level. This will allow us to select two targets that will be developed and deployed in Years 5-7 of the fellowship in both policy and as an intervention that allows adolescents to experiment with changing their own social media use to improve their mental health. This research will be complemented by an agile pipeline of co-investigation and knowledge exchange with policymakers and stakeholders to address current questions in policy and practice, to ensure this investment is continuously creating positive impact for young people throughout the fellowship. This will be supported by an internship scheme that recruits talented undergraduate students from backgrounds underrepresented in academic research to assist my team and policy partners on select summer project 'sprints'. In depth co-creation with young people and parents will further tailor research outputs and dissemination throughout the fellowship. The evidence provided by my fellowship will therefore feed into crucial national decisions about childhood and digitalisation that will shape the lives of our children today and adults tomorrow, for decades to come.

青少年估计他们每天花在网上的时间不到5小时。这几乎与他们在学校的时间一样多，英国平均每天上学时间为6.5小时。在过去十年中，青少年的心理健康状况也大幅下降，给英国的卫生服务、社会和经济带来了大规模的压力。这使得许多人担心数字化正在积极损害青少年的心理健康。然而，我们对这种担忧是否有道理仍然知之甚少。这是皇家精神病医学院院长（“我们迫切需要对技术使用的好处和危害进行更多的研究”）和英国首席医疗官（“.卫生机构和研究机构应支持更全面的研究。需要建立一个衡量儿童数字参与的适当机制。许多关于数字化和青少年心理健康的研究都集中在社交媒体上，这是一种特别高风险的数字创新。青少年大量使用社交媒体（16- 17岁的青少年中有94%拥有社交媒体资料），并对社会环境带来了变化，可能会放大先前存在的脆弱性。例如，同伴排斥在青少年时期尤其突出，是一个心理健康的危险因素。社交媒体通过“喜欢”计数来量化青少年从同龄人那里获得的社会反馈，这可能会增加社会反馈的显着性，例如拒绝，因此增加心理健康风险（机制A）。进一步的社交媒体使青少年能够继续接触同龄人，这对青少年非常有吸引力。这可能导致习惯性的社交媒体使用和自我控制失败，直接或间接地影响心理健康（机制B）。然而，研究社交媒体使用与精神疾病之间联系的研究结果在很大程度上是不一致的，共识并没有超越这种联系是复杂的说法。这使得设计基于证据的建议和干预措施以应对社交媒体对社会，政策和行业的影响变得非常具有挑战性（例如，在线安全法案）。我的奖学金将通过提供基础和应用研究的突破性组合来解决这个问题。我的团队将采取一种新颖的机械方法，调查社交媒体对青少年心理健康影响的潜在机制（例如，机制A和B等）。我们将首先使用三个不同层次的科学解释（经验，算法和生物/认知）的观察数据来研究这些感兴趣的机制。然后，我们将在纵向研究中系统地操纵它们，以测试它们对个人心理健康的影响。这将使我们能够选择两个目标，这些目标将在奖学金的第5-7年制定和部署，作为政策和干预措施，允许青少年尝试改变他们自己的社交媒体使用，以改善他们的心理健康。这项研究将得到与政策制定者和利益攸关方进行共同调查和知识交流的灵活渠道的补充，以解决政策和实践中的当前问题，以确保这项投资不断为整个奖学金的年轻人创造积极影响。这将得到一项实习计划的支持，该计划招募来自学术研究背景不足的才华横溢的本科生，以协助我的团队和政策合作伙伴完成选定的夏季项目“冲刺”。与年轻人和家长的深入共同创造将进一步调整研究成果和整个奖学金的传播。因此，我的奖学金提供的证据将为有关儿童和数字化的重要国家决策提供信息，这些决策将在未来几十年内塑造我们今天的儿童和明天的成年人的生活。