Americans report mixed views about social media in APA poll
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One-third of Americans believed social media has had a negative impact on society at large, and 42% said it has damaged political discourse, according to results of the American Psychiatric Association’s February 2022 Healthy Minds Monthly poll.
The poll was conducted by Morning Consult between Jan. 19 and 20, with a nationally representative sample of 2,210 adults.
When asked how they personally felt while using social media, 80% of users reported feeling interested, 72% felt connected and 72% felt happy, whereas 26% said they felt helpless, and 22% felt jealous.
“Twenty-five years into what almost feels like a giant psychological experiment, most Americans are interacting with social media daily, and many are concerned about its effects on mental health and society,” APA President Vivian Pender, MD, said in a press release. “Volumes have been written on its various impacts. The bottom line is that we know enough to say that when things get overwhelming, there are simple steps we can all be aware of and take to manage our usage.”
Many adults who used social media during the COVID-19 pandemic said they used it to connect with family and friends (80%) or for entertainment (76%). Thirty-one percent reported social media has helped, and 49% reported it has had no impact on their relationship with friends and family. Parents reported that social media had helped (23%) or did not affect (46%) their child’s self-esteem; however, one-fifth noted that it had negatively affected their child’s mental health.
“We know that social media can be very harmful for some individuals,” APA CEO and medical director Saul Levin, MD, MPA, said in the release. “It has the effect of turning up the volume on conversations and connecting people in ways that can have a negative impact. That said, these poll results seem to indicate that many Americans are finding an ability to use social media in a way that feels harmless if not helpful to their lives.”
Sixty-seven percent of participants said they were confident about how to help a loved one if they expressed mental health challenges via social media.