By Gavin Boyle
Social media targets young girls with concerning content, a recent study found.
The study set up a new Instagram account posing as a 13 year old girl. It found that even when researchers did not engage with the content in any way, Instagram fed the account a constant stream of disturbing posts revolving around mental health and eating disorders.
“An experiment has been confirmed repeatedly – you can try this, too. Set up an Instagram or TikTok account as a 13yo girl. When asked about your interests, or in your Explore page, click on things like puppies, kittens, and nature,” psychologist Jonathan Haidt wrote in an Instagram post about the study. “Within a week, the depressive, self-harm, and eating disorder content starts being fed to you (in some experiments, like one by Channel4 in the UK, within *35 minutes*).”
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“Social media companies know how to get to the insecurities in preteens and teens, and how to explore those insecurities. That for them is time on app…” Haidt continued later in his post. “This is why governments are adopting age-gating policies. Because social media is NOT safe for kids. And it’s why as parents and caretakers, we need to delay giving kids access to social media. It’s not just ‘the internet’ – it’s these aggressive algorithms that will do anything to keep your kid’s attention, and will demolish their self-esteem in the process.”
Haidt’s post further discussed the impact child safety measures from these platforms have had on protecting young users from this harmful content. While there was a noticeable difference in how often they were shown mental health and eating disorder posts, this content was still a part of the feed a disturbing amount of time: roughly 25% of all posts curated for the user.
Unfortunately, Meta, and most other social media companies, know that their platforms are addictive and want them to be that way. So, they spend billions of dollars creating their algorithms, enabling them to keep users online, even when it ruins their mental health and self-esteem.
Meta is not alone in placing profits over safety. Earlier this month, court documents were made public revealing that YouTube deliberately aimed for user addiction to the platform, placing watch time above user safety.
“Internal chat logs and presentations from YouTube employees were unsealed ahead of a series of landmark trials slated for this summer in Oakland, Calif., in the US District Court of Northern California. Google-owned YouTube, Meta, Snap, and TikTok are listed as defendants,” the court documents said.
As governments at the state and federal level begin to implement laws to protect children from these predatory platforms, social media companies are starting to be held accountable for their reckless actions. This year, Meta already lost two major cases which found the company guilty of failing to protect its users.
While it is encouraging to see big tech held accountable for how it preys on young users, parents still need to be the first line of protection for their children and seriously consider when and how they allow their them to access these sites.
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