PSYCHOLOGIST WARNS SOCIAL MEDIA BANS FOR TEENS LIKELY COUNTERPRODUCTIVE

Candice Odgers, a professor of developmental psychology at the University of California, Irvine, has stated that social media bans for teenagers are likely to worsen rather than improve online safety. Odgers, who has studied adolescent mental health for 25 years, expressed disappointment at the UK's decision to follow Australia in implementing an age-based social media ban. She said the global trend towards removing phones from schools and banning social media for under-16s represents a misguided policy direction. Odgers argues that politicians and parents are focusing on the wrong issues when they identify social media as the primary driver of a growing mental health crisis among young people.

Odgers has analysed available evidence and concluded there is limited data supporting the claim that social media is driving a decline in adolescent mental health. She also questioned whether children's brains have been substantially altered by mobile phone use. Her position contrasts with that of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, author of The Anxious Generation, who recently told BBC Radio 4 that he had successfully kept his children away from social media. Odgers takes a different approach with her own family, having given both her children smartphones at age 11 and allowing her daughter to use Snapchat at the same age. Both scientists have reviewed the same research but reached markedly different conclusions about online risks to young people.

Odgers highlighted that the debate around social media bans obscures other significant challenges facing teenagers, including the impacts of Covid-19 and the mental health of their adult caregivers. She characterised a blanket social media ban as an unfair and impractical policy response. The disagreement between Odgers and Haidt reflects broader scientific uncertainty about the causal relationship between social media use and adolescent mental health outcomes.