American Psychological Association: Teens are spending nearly 5 hours daily on social media. Here are the mental health outcomes

by Tori DeAngelis

Forty-one percent of teens with the highest social media use rate their overall mental health as poor or very poor.

41%

Percentage of teens with the highest social media use who rate their overall mental health as poor or very poor, compared with 23% of those with the lowest use. For example, 10% of the highest use group expressed suicidal intent or self-harm in the past 12 months compared with 5% of the lowest use group, and 17% of the highest users expressed poor body image compared with 6% of the lowest users.

4.8 hours

Average number of hours a day that U.S. teens spend using seven popular social media apps, with YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram accounting for 87% of their social media time. Specifically, 37% of teens say they spend 5 or more hours a day, 14% spend 4 to less than 5 hours a day, 26% spend 2 to less than 4 hours a day, and 23% spend less than 2 hours a day on these three apps.

[Related: Potential risks of content, features, and functions: The science of how social media affects youth]

60%

Percentage of the highest frequency social media users who report low parental monitoring and weak parental relationships who said they had poor or very poor mental health, compared with 25% of the highest frequency users who report high parental monitoring and strong parental relationships. Similarly, 22% of the highest users with poor parental relationships and monitoring expressed thoughts of suicide or self-harm compared with 2% of high users with strong parental relationships and monitoring.

Strong parental relationships and monitoring significantly cut the risk of mental health problems among teen social media users, even among those with significant screen time stats.

Read more at apa.org.