Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued a warning in a briefing this week on the negative impact of social media on kids, particularly teenage girls. Murthy called tech companies to provide “safeguards” to protect children who are at a critical stage in brain development. Early exposure to social media, numerous studies show, are correlated with anxiety and depression in young people. Murthy said,

“We are in the middle of a national youth mental health crisis, and I am concerned that social media is an important driver of that crisis – one that we must urgently address.”

Social media could harm youth mental health, U.S. Surgeon General warns | Reuters

Problems like body image issues, low self-esteem, and social comparison are all typical outcomes of excessive social media use among teens and children. The Reuters report continues,

Adolescents who spend more than three hours per day on social media face double the risk of experiencing poor mental health outcomes, such as symptoms of depression and anxiety, according to the advisory.

Solutions to help combat these troubling mental health trends include getting family more involved in children’s tech use. Creating a “family plan” of social media usage and boundaries is crucial. Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt thinks teens shouldn’t even have social media until they’re at least sixteen. Others even say the age should be bumped up to age twenty-one, indicating that social media needs to be treated akin to alcohol consumption.

Whatever the way forward, Murthy’s advisory message points to a problem that doesn’t seem to be improving. Hopefully his words will help us wake up a bit more on the mental health crisis unfolding in our midst.