Understanding the affects social media can have on young adolescents today and best practices.

1. Untangling the Web:
How Social Media
Affects Mental Healthand
How to Help
Presented by Christopher Leonard, MSW, LCSW, M.Ed.
Director of Operations, Sage Day School & Sage Thrive
Services

2. A 13-year-old girl on a 12- minute ride
in the car
Anecdote

3. About Me, Sage Day and Sage Thrive
Christopher Leonard Sage Thrive Sage Day
01

4. Learning
Objectives
Reflect on the numerous factors
driving disruptive change today (it’s
not just social media) and how
these impact mental health.
Understand the psychological,
developmental, and social impacts
of social media on young people,
and why young people are so
strongly influenced by social media.
Clarify the challenges facing young
people today and identify the skills
they need to develop in order to
optimize their mental health.
Understand best practices for
mentoring young people through
their use of social media and digital
technology.
02

5. 3
Which of These Statements Most Closely Represents
Your View of Social Media?
Social media facilitates our connections with
A. others, especially for individuals who have been
marginalized, raises awareness and can save
lives.
Social media is addictive, threatens self-image,
B. exacerbates psychological stress and fosters a
false sense of control and security.

6. Did You Know: Shift
Happens 2018
4
As you watch the video
consider the impact of
today’s pace of change on
mental health and jot down
any thoughts.
Pair and Share
Pair and Share
Disruptive Change: It’s not
just social media...

7. Trending Now:
Happiness
iGen
Why Today's Super-Connected Kids Are
Growing Up Less Rebellious, More
Tolerant, Less Happy--and Completely
Unprepared for Adulthood--and What That
Means for the Rest of Us
by Jean Twenge
5

8. Trending Now:
Satisfaction
iGen
by Jean Twenge
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9. Trending Now:
Feeling Left Out
iGen
by Jean Twenge
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10. Research On ScreenTime
Sleep:
Sleeping With a Device: -20.6 minutes/night (Falbe et. al.,
2015)
Bedside Device = Less Sleep/Poorer Sleep (Klodiana, et. a.,
2014)
↑ Blue Light ↓ Melatonin
Social Media Use 30 minutes before bed = ↑Sleep
Disturbance (Levenson, et. al, 2017,July)
Obesity:
2+ hrs/Day = 2x Obesity (Wood, et. al., 2013)
Aggression? Trauma? Desensitization?
Desensitization = Most Common (Cline, et. al, 1973)
Dandelions and Orchids (Piotrowski & Valkenburg, 2015)
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11. 9
Patterns of Digital
Media Use
Ages 13-18 = 9 Hrs/Day ,Ages 8 -12=
6 Hrs/Day (Rideout, 2015)
On my device within 5 minutes of
waking = 25% (PR Newswire, 2013,
March 19)
In 2008 about 50% ofteens were on
social media.
By 2015, 87% of HS girls and 77% of HS
boys were on social media.
Daily Use = 92% ,“Constant Use” = 24%
(Pew Research, 2015)

12. Take moment to reflect on your own
middle school years or high school
years.
1. What was most important to you?
2. What did you worry about?
Pair and Share
Time Machine
10

13. Social Media and Teen Developmental Needs
Identity: See me for
who I am.
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Mirroring
Belonging and Significance:
I need to feel part of the
group.
Twinship
I need people to look up
to and emulate.
Idealization
Developmental Tasks According to the Self Psychology
Kohut, H. (1974). The analysis of the self. New York: International University Press.

14. 12
"Think of your future"
How Far Into The
Future We Can
see...
Age 2: NOW
Ages 3-5: 5 - 20 minutes
1st grade: Severalhours
3rd grade: 8 -12 hours
Ages 12 -16 : 2 -3 days
Ages 17-23: 2-3 weeks
Ages 23-35: 3-5 weeks

15. Social Media Issue 1: Lies, Fears
and Outrage
“The truth is that these companies won’t fundamentally change because
their entire business model relies on generating more engagement and
nothing generates more engagement than lies, fear and outrage.”
- Sacha Baron Cohen, quoted in The New York Times December 13, 2019
• 12th-grade female: “Influencers have so much power. The Kim
Kardashians are major influencers. They get away with posting
scandalous pictures. If I did this there would be many more negative
repercussions.”
•
9th-grade male: Cancel Culture: Influencers fight with each other
online. One influencer will publicly post to another, “you’re cancelled,
you’re over.” This popularizes drama and conflict.
13

16. Social Media Issue 2: Addictiveness
8th grade girl: “I live on Instagram When I first got on Instagram, I didn’t
care about followers. But losing 10 followers can change your mood.”
• Peekaboo!...Infants and toddlers love repetition...Electronic media
feeds this love
• Reward Seeking →Dopamine Release (Bromberg et.al., 2010)
#LIKES!! #candycrush #stickyapps
• Always on...I can find my friends, my adventures, my solace...24/7
• #FOMO
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17. 10th grade boy: “The most annoying
thing is oversharing. Some things we
just don’t need to know!”
8th grade girl: “People try to use
their mental health issues to get
attention.”
8th grade boy: “Unless you block
someone, they can send you
whatever they want.”
Issue 3a: Personal Boundaries
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“This is the new reality of teen social life: it’s conducted online, for all to see with clear
messages about who’s in and who’s out.” (Twenge, 2017)
Blurring and blending of the
personal and the public.

18. Issue 3a: Time Boundaries (Homayoun, 2018)
“There is no time and space in the digital world. People chat and
collaborate through social networks. Cultural icons garner millions of fans
online in locations they have often never been themselves. The boundary
between public and private life is now everyone's business.”
-Eduardo Paes, former mayor of Rio deJaneiro
16
• Sheer volume of information and content
• Unlimited options...The Paradox of Choice (Schwartz,
2016)
• Always Available, Always On
• Hanging Out (danah boyd, 2015)

19. Issue 4: Anonymity, Incivility, &
Misinterpretation
A 2013 study found that anonymous posters on online reader
comment boards were more likely to behave in an uncivil manner
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• 12th Grade boy: “It’s much easier to type something to someone
than to say it and what is typed can be read a hundred different
ways.”
• 10th Grade girl: “People will say things behind a screen that
they would never say in person.”
• 8th grade girl “There is so much drama around influencers, lots
of rumors and lies.”

20. Issue 5: Emotional Readiness
• 8th grade girl: “People can mess up your life. You can go from
being a happy 10-year-old to depressed.”
• 8th grade boy: “It’s hard to be yourself in the LGBTQ community.
People are constantly telling me and my friends to kill
ourselves.”
• 10th grade boy: “I got into social media to be more social, to
practice my social skills. [Laughing] That didn’t work out so well!”
• 11th grade girl: “Seeing friends hang out without you is the
worst!”
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21. Issue 6: Developing Identity vs. Conformity
8th grade girl: “You have to be
skinny, not over a certain height.
Your skin has to be perfect and,
I’m sorry, I have pores.”
12th grade girl: “People have an Insta
face vs. an actual face. It makes you
hate the way you look compared to a
Kardashian.”
8th grade boy: “You’re forced to
grown up too fast. It influences you
to do more adult things.”
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12th grade boy: “It changes how
people present themselves, even
offline.”

22. Altered Expectations (Homayoun, 2018)
• Worry About Likes
-Feeds the Addiction
-Comparing Self Unfavorably →Sense of
Inadequacy
• Fixed Mindset vs Growth Mindset (Dweck,
2017)
“Friendship”
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Effect Pattern: Troubled
Kinship...How Do I Fitin?

23. • 8th grade girl: “It’s unsafe. [Social Media] needs
to have more features to protect
people...community guidelines suck. I’ve reported
plenty of inappropriate stuff. Nothing happens.”
• 8th grade boy: “Sometimes people use it to
threaten and blackmail kids.”
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Effect Pattern: Threat
To Safety

24. Effect Pattern: Social Skills
22
Ability to think for
oneself
Concern for
others
Loss of in-person
skills

25. 23
Positive Takes
Content Creation
Business Promotion
Good Influencers
Brings People Together
12th grade girl: “With my friends we boost
our self confidence with each other.”

26. 24
Discuss: Challenges and Skills
Given the changing landscape we have
been discussing today, what challenges
are you seeing for young people?
What are the key skills young people will
need to meet these challenges?

27. Core Navigation
Strategies
Modeling
Parenting Style
Mentoring over Monitoring
Assessing
Limit Setting
Perspective
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28. Do As I Say?
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Parents Celebrities Device use for
school
Sources of Mixed Messages(Kamenetz, 2016)

29. “Empathy is the App” = Benign Curiosity
Balance and boundaries using your own
devices
Think about what you are posting...What are
you modeling?
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Modeling (Heitner, 2016)

30. NEGLECTFUL
(No Structure, No Freedom)
Parenting Styles
PERMISSIVE
(Freedom, No Structure)
AUTHORITATIVE
(Freedom & Structure)
Kindness
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Firmness
AUTHORITARIAN
(Structure, No Freedom)

31. Foster Discernment
Practice Benign Curiosity
Responses over Consequences
Screen time: Consumption vs. Creation
Collaborate on Solutions
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Mentoring Outlasts
Monitoring (Heitner, 2016)

32. PROBLEMATIC AND RISKY INTERNET
USESCREENING SCALE (PRIUSS)
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• 18 Item, 4-point Scale (0 for Never - 4
for Very Often)
• Measures
- Social Impairment
- Emotional Impairment
- Risky/Impulsive Internet Use
• Cumulative Scale score of 25+
indicates problematic use
Assessing For Online or
Gaming Addiction

33. Limit Setting
(Heitner, 2016)
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• Reflection over Restriction
• Time Limits: How is the time
being spent?
• Content Limits: Grand Theft Auto
and Cops & Robbers
• Gradual release of responsibility

34. If You Decide to Monitor Use
What are you looking for?
30
Empathy first...Benign Curiosity
How will you respond?
Consequences: Applied or
Natural?

35. Jedidiah Jenkins, author of To Shake the
Sleeping Self: A Journey from Oregon to
Patagonia and a Quest for a Life with No
Regret
Pair and Share
Perspective
31

36. References
Anxiety and Depression Association of America (2018) Myths and Facts About Anxiety Retrieved January 12, 2020. From
https://adaa.org/understanding-anxiety/myth-conceptions
Boyd, danah. (2015). It’s complicated the social lives of networked teens. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Bromberg-Martin, E.S., Matsumoto,M. nd Hikosaka, O.. “Dopamine in Motivational Control: Rewarding, Aversive, and Alerting,” Neuron 68,
no. 5 (2010): 815–834.
Dweck, C. (2017). Mindset. London: Robinson.
Heitner, D. (2016). Screenwise: helping kids thrive (and survive) in their digital world. Brookline, MA: Bibliomotion, Inc.
Homayoun, A. (2018). Social media wellness: helping tweens and teens thrive in an unbalanced digital world. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin,
a Sage Company.
Jelenchick, L.A., et al. (2014). “The Problematic and Risky Internet Use Screening Scale (PRIUSS) for Adolescents and Young Adults: Scale
Development and Refinement,” Computers in Human Behavior 35: 171–178.
http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/kplu/files/201502/PRIUSS_scale_and_guidelines.pdf
Kamenetz, A. (2018). The art of screen time: how your family can balance digital media and real life. New York: PublicAffairs.
Kohut, H. (1974). The analysis of the self. New York: International University Press.

37. References
Lanaj Klodiana, Russell E. Johnson, and Christopher M. Barnes, “Beginning the Workday yet Already Depleted? Consequences of Late-Night
Smartphone Use and Sleep,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 124, no. 1 (2014): 11–23.
Levenson, Jessica & Shensa, Ariel & Sidani, Jaime & Colditz, Jason & Primack, Brian. (2017). Social Media Use Before Bed and Sleep
Disturbance Among Young Adults in the United States: A Nationally Representative Study. Sleep. 40. 10.1093/sleep/zsx113.
Perrie E. Pardee et al., “Television Viewing and Hypertension in Obese Children,” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 33, no. 6 J.
Pew Research Center. (2015). More than half of teens text with friends daily. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from
http://www.pewinternet.org/ 2015/ 08/ 06/ teens-technology-and-friendships/2015-08-06_teens-and-friendships_0-02/
Piotrowski, T. and Valkenburg, P.M. (2015) “Finding Orchids in a Field of Dandelions: Understanding Children’s Differential Susceptibility to
Media Effects,” American Behavioral Scientist 59 (: 1776–1789, doi: 10.1177/ 0002764215596552. (2007): 439–443.
PRNewswire. (2013, March 19). Generation Z: A look at the technology and media habits of today’s teens. Retrieved January 11, 2020,
from www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/generation-z-a-look-at-the-technology-and-media-habits-of-todays-teens-198958011. Html
Rideout, V. (2015). The Common Sense Census: Media use by teens and tweens (pp. 14–15). Common Sense Media. Retrieved January
11, 2020, from https://www.commonsensemedia.org/sites/default/files/uploads/research/2019-census-8-to-18-full-report-updated.pdf

38. References
Santana, A.D. (2013). Virtuous or vitriolic: the effect of anonymity on civility on online newspaper boards. Journalism Practice 8(1).
Retrieved January 22, 2020 from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263729295_Virtuous_or_Vitriolic_The_Effect_of_Anonymity_on_Civility_in_Online_Newspaper_R
eader_Comment_Boards
Schwartz, B. (2016). The paradox of choice: why more is less. New York: Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
Twenge. J. (2017). iGen: Why today’s super-connected kids are growing up less rebellious, more tolerant, less happy, and completely
unprepared for adulthood. New York. Atria Books.
Victor B. Cline, Roger G. Croft, and Steven Courrier, “Desensitization of Children to Television Violence,” Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology 27, no. 3 (1973): 360.
Jennifer Falbe et al., “Sleep Duration, Restfulness, and Screens in the Sleep Environment,” Pediatrics 135, no. 2 (2015): e367–e375.
Wood B. et al., “Light Level and Duration of Exposure Determine the Impact of Self-Luminous Tablets on Melatonin Suppression,” Applied
Ergonomics 44, no. 2 (2013): 237–240.

39. Q&A