Research suggests there’s no connection between social media and teen mental health: Zuckerberg

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg pushed back on claims that social media is directly responsible for harming teen mental health during an interview with The Verge.

Zuckerberg pointed to academic research, stating that "the majority of the high-quality research out there suggests that there’s no causal connection at a broad scale between these things."

Zuckerberg’s comments align with his previous testimony before Congress in January, where he argued that existing research has not conclusively proven that social media negatively impacts teen mental health.

While acknowledging the difficulty of proving causality, Zuckerberg emphasized that social media can have both positive and negative effects on adolescents.

He advocated for equipping parents with tools to manage their children’s social media use, stating that Meta can contribute to improving the situation even if the company is not the cause.

Meta has recently introduced features such as private accounts for teens, restricted DMs, and “Sleep Mode” to limit notifications during the night. Additionally, a suite of parental controls for Instagram and Messenger was launched last year to offer parents more oversight.

Concerns over social media's impact on youth mental health intensified following the 2021 release of internal Meta documents, known as the Facebook Papers, which suggested that the company was aware of Instagram’s potential harm to some teens.

This revelation spurred calls from U.S. lawmakers for stricter age-gating measures, with some supporting the idea of warning labels akin to those used for tobacco.

Zuckerberg also reiterated that app store operators like Google and Apple should be responsible for enforcing age verification, stating that it is already a standard practice in online payments.

Despite his stance, Zuckerberg said Meta would comply with any government regulations on child safety.